Print and illustrated book publisher, established in 1919 by Irmgard Kiepenheuer and Hans Müller. Müller had been managing secretary at Gustav Kiepenheuer, the publishing house Irmgard and her husband, Gustav, had run together in Weimar since 1909. After the couple separated, Irmgard founded her own company together with Müller. (In 1925 Müller & Co. changed its name to Müller & Kiepenheuer after winning a lawsuit filed by her former spouse.) Kiepenheuer hosted a cultural salon in Potsdam and was in personal contact with contemporary artists, including many from the Bauhaus in Weimar. From 1921 to 1924 distributed the Bauhaus's portfolio series New European Graphics, which constituted an international survey of avant-garde printmakers and also served to raise funds for the Bauhaus. Distributed four such portfolios, including one with a focus on German artists that featured prints by Max Beckmann, George Grosz, Erich Heckel, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Oskar Kokoschka, Max Pechstein, Christian Rohlfs, and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, among others. Kiepenheuer had a special interest in book design, and in 1923, under the aegis of writer Franz Blei, began to issue a series of illustrated literary classics, Sanssouci Books. Relocated to Berlin in 1934; closed by decree of the Reich Culture Chamber in 1944. Reestablished after the war and sold in 1962.

Selected Bibliography

Tripmacker, Wolfgang. "Irmgard Kiepenheuer als Verlegerin." Margi-nalien 143, no. 3 (1996): 37–47.

Weber, Klaus, ed. Punkt, Linie, Fläche: Druckgraphik am Bauhaus. Berlin: G+H, 1999.