Gerhard Altenbourg was born Gerhard Ströch in 1926 in Thuringia. From 1948 to 1950 he studied at the Bauhaus University in Weimar. He participated in II. documenta in Kassel in 1959, received the Burda Prize for Graphic Art in 1966, the Prize of the 2nd Internationale for Drawing in 1967 and the Will Grohmann Prize in 1968. A first retrospective was held in 1968 in Hanover, Baden-Baden, West Berlin, Hamburg and Düsseldorf. In 1970 he was appointed a member of the Academy of Arts, West Berlin. In 1986 a retrospective was held for the first time in the GDR in Leipzig, Dresden and East Berlin. Altenbourg died in Meissen (Saxony) at the end of 1989.
Horst Antes was born in Heppenheim (Hesse) in 1936. He studied art at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe under HAP Grieshaber. In 1957 he received the Art Prize of the City of Hanover, in 1961 the Young West art prize of the city of Recklinghausen, the Prix des artistes at the IIe Biennale des jeunes artistes in Paris and in 1966 the UNESCO Prize for the Promotion of the Arts at the Venice Biennale. From 1962 to 1963 scholarships for the Villa Romana and the Villa Massimo enabled him to spend time in Italy. From 1967 to 1973 and from 1984 to 2000 he taught as a professor at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe. Since 1985 Antes has lived in Karlsruhe (Baden-Württemberg), Italy and Berlin.
Armando was born Herman Dirk van Dodeweerd in Amsterdam in 1929. From 1949 to 1954 he studied art history and philosophy at the University of Amsterdam. In 1979 he came to West Berlin on a DAAD scholarship. In 1982 he participated in documenta 7 and represented the Netherlands at the Venice Biennale in 1984. From 1996 he was a member of the Academy of Arts, Berlin. Queen Beatrix awarded him the Medal of Honour for Art and Science in 2009. In 2013 the Armando Foundation was established in the Netherlands. Armando passed away in Potsdam (Brandenburg) in 2018.
Georg Baselitz was born Hans-Georg Bruno Kern in 1938 in Deutschbaselitz (Saxony). After interrupting his painting studies, which had begun in 1956 at the Weissensee University of the Arts in East Berlin, he continued at the University of the Fine Arts in West Berlin under Hann Trier. Baselitz has participated several times at documenta in Kassel as well as in the Venice Biennale, exhibited his works in the Nationalgalerie in Berlin, the Centre Pompidou in Paris and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. From 1978 to 1983 he taught at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Karlsruhe, and later became a professor at the University of Arts, West Berlin. Baselitz lives and works in Bavaria and Italy.
Kerstin Baudis was born in East Berlin in 1956. After completing evening studies at the Weissensee University of the Arts in East Berlin, from 1980 to 1985 she studied art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Leipzig. She is involved in artistic projects such as the communication space Frankfurt (Oder)/Slubice (Poland) and the art project Zementwerk Rüdersdorf in Brandenburg. Baudis lives and works near Berlin.
Hans Bellmer was born in Kattowitz (today Katowice, Poland) in 1902. In the 1920s he began studying engineering in Berlin and came into contact with protagonists of the Dada movement. During a stay in Paris in 1925–26, he was present in Dadaist circles. In 1938 he moved to Paris and became acquainted with the Surrealists around André Breton. After the war years he lived in the south of France. 1949 saw him return to Paris. He participated in documenta as well as in II. documenta. Bellmer died in Paris in 1975.
Christa Dichgans was born in Berlin in 1940. From 1960 to 1965 she studied at the University of the Fine Arts, West Berlin. With a scholarship from the German Academic Scholarship Foundation, she came to New York and then settled in Rome. Between 1984 and 1988 Dichgans was assistant to Georg Baselitz at the University of Arts, West Berlin. In the 1990s she found inspiration on several extensive trips through Russia and Asia. She is considered a pioneer of German Pop Art. Dichgans died in Berlin in 2018.