Paul Klee

Paul Klee was a Swiss-born artist whose distinctive style drew from expressionism, cubism, surrealism, and orientalism. Originally trained as a violinist, Klee turned to visual art in his teens, drawn to its expressive freedom. Though he initially worked only in black and white and doubted he would ever become a painter, a transformative trip to Tunisia awakened his sensitivity to color and inspired his lifelong exploration of its possibilities. Today, Klee is recognized as a pioneer of color theory, and his Writings on Form and Design Theory are considered as foundational to modern art as Leonardo da Vinci’s treatises were to the Renaissance.