Meadowlark Gallery: The Artist Biographies

Hans Kleiber (1887-1967)
The following was done by James T. Forrest and was entitled, "The Art of Hans Kleiber." The art of Hans Kleiber belongs to the long-standing tradition of America's concern for its own uniqueness as a land area. This was the tradition that inspired Hans Kleiber to record his own sector of the country -- the region of the Big Horn mountains in north central Wyoming. Hans Kleiber, living as he did most of his life with nature, understood these longings of man to live in harmony with his environment, but he recognized also man's ignorance regarding the harm he could do in his attempt to "tame" nature. As a Forest Ranger he saw the hazards to wildlife when timber was carelessly harvested. He also saw the glory of man's concern when he properly understood the things of nature and bent his energies to protect and preserve these precious gifts. Kleiber did watercolor, partly because it can be done easily in the field, but with varying skill. It was not his greatest strength. But he did produce a great number of fresh and delightful sketches of the Big Horns, as well as several carefully detailed watercolor and gouache paintings of wildlife and ranch scenes. He used oils, at first with the typical over-meticulous style of the untrained -- for Hans was largely self-trained, and he experimented on his own, discovering, as he painted, methods and techniques which worked for him. But later, by the 1930's, he had achieved a very pleasing combination of brush and palette knife forte, of which there are several fine examples. However, Kleiber was primarily a printmaker. He began with pure etching (the bitten line), added to this drypoint lines, and then discovered, with gratification, the warm tones possible by the use of aquatint (the use of a ground to produce the grain or shadings on a print). Finally he combined all of the above in some of his finest works. He also used a difficult, but not uncommon, method of toning -- using colored inks in stages of printing from an aquatint plate to produce limited editions of beautiful color prints. Finally, Hans painstakingly hand-colored hundreds of prints during the last twenty years of his life -- a time-consuming process of adding watercolor to previously printed etchings.


Unfortunately, during the last few years of Kleiber's life the strain of the close work incumbent on all etchers took its toll on his eyes; he could not see well enough to draw the lines on the waxed surface of the plates or to do the even more critical drypoint lines. He regretted this but found some solace in the coloring of the most popular of the prints he had pulled from the earlier plates. Hans Kleiber had considerable success and recognition during his lifetime, largely for his printmaking.



View high resolution images of works by Hans Kleiber when available.
Etchings/Photogravures

"A Burial On The Prairie"
(Etching)

"A Duck Blind"
(Etching)

"A Flock Of Honkers"
(Etching)

"A Homesteader Plowing"
(Etching)

"A Pair of Pheasants"
(Photogravure)

"A Pair of Pintails"
(Etching)

"A Pair of Shovellers"
(Etching)

"Across The Hills"
(Etching)

"Barataria"
(Etching)

"Bighorn Peaks"
(Etching)

"Bon Voyage II"
(Etching)

"Campfire"
(Etching)

"Canadian Goose"
(Etching)

"Cedar Waxwings"
(Etching)

"Custer Battlefield"
(Photogravure)

"Dayton--Wyoming"
(Photogravure)

"Dayton, Wyoming"
(Photogravure)

"Ducks On Jackson Lake"
(Etching)

"Ducks On Loon Lake"
(Etching)

"Eddie Moore's Ranch, Banner, Wyoming"
(Photogravure)

"Egrets"
(Etching)

"Evening At Elk Lake--Wyoming"
(Etching, Two Ink Process)

"Evening At Elk Lake--Wyoming"
Unsigned
(Etching, Two Ink Process)

"Evening On The Marshes"
(Etching)

"Evening On The Range"
(Etching, Two Ink Process)

"Evening On The Trail"
(Etching)
 

"Fall In The Rockies"
(Etching)

"Fishing On Piney"
(Photogravure)

"Fremont Peak-Wind River"
(Etching)

"Frontier Days"
(Photogravure)

"Geese Crossing Wyoming"
(Etching)


"Geese on the Pacific"
(Photogravure)

"Geese Rising"
(Etching)

"Geese Settling" a.k.a. "Honkers Settling"
(Hand Colored Etching)

"Green River Lake"
(Etching)
   

"In Full Flight"
(Etching)
 

"Killers"
(Photogravure)

"Lake Geneva Bighorns Wyo"
(Etching)

"Lake Solitude" a.k.a. "Lake Solitude I" a.k.a.
"Solitude I"
(Etching)

"Late Arrivals"
(Etching, Two Ink Process)

"Little Goose--Wyo."
First State
(Etching)
   

"My Home Town"
(Photogravure)
   

"On The Oregon Trail"
(Etching)

"On The Oregon Trail"
(Etching)
"On Yellowstone Lake"
(Etching)
"On Yellowstone Lake"
(Etching)

"Quail" Second State
(Etching)
   

"Range Horses"
First State
(Etching)

"Range Horses"
(Etching)

"Range Horses"
(Photogravure)

"Range Horses"
(Photogravure)

"Returning From The Hunt"
(Etching)
 

"Settling At Sundown"
(Etching)

"Sheep Creek Ridge"
(Etching)

"Sheep In The Bighorns"
(Photogravure)

"Stormy Afternoon"
(Etching)

"Summer In The Rockies"
(Etching)

"Summer Range"
(Etching)

"Swallowtails"
(Etching)

"Teal"
(Etching)

"The Grand Canyon"
(Photogravure)
"The Skiers"
(Etching)

"The Sun Bath"
(Etching)

"The Trailherd"
(Etching)

"The Winter Trail"
(Etching and Canceled Plate)


"The Wire Gate"
(Photogravure)


"Three Pintails"
(Etching)

"Titmice"
(Etching)
 

"Untitled--Tepee Lodge"
(Etching)
   

"Virginia Deer"
(Etching)
   

"Watering Sheep"
(Photogravure)

"Whistling Swans"
(Etching)

"Winter In The Bighorns"
(Hand Colored Etching)
Oil Paintings
Pen and Ink
Watercolor Paintings

"Hans Kleiber,
Wyoming Printmaker and Artist"

by
Marylee M. Moreland
and
Gary L. Temple

Click here for more details!!

 

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