Paul Klee Biography: Parents, Height, Net Worth, Age, Ethnicity, Spouse, Children

Paul Ernst Klee was a Swiss-German painter, draftsman, printmaker, and art theorist whose innovative work bridged multiple modern art movements, including Expressionism, Cubism, and Surrealism.

Celebrated for his whimsical yet profound visual language—marked by delicate lines, vibrant color harmonies, and symbolic abstraction—Klee produced over 9,000 works and profoundly influenced 20th-century art.

Profile

• Full Name: Paul Ernst Klee
• Stage Name: Paul Klee
• Born: 18, December 1879
• Date of death: 29, June 1940 (Aged: 60 years old)
• Birthplace: Münchenbuchsee, Bern, Switzerland
• Nationality: Swiss-German
• Occupation: Painter, Draftsman, Printmaker, and Art Theorist
• Height: Unknown
• Parents: Hans Wilhelm Klee and Ida Maria Frick
• Siblings: Mathilde Klee
• Spouse: Lily Stumpf (m. 1906)
• Children: Felix Paul Klee
• Relationship: Married
• Net Worth: Unknown

Early Life and Education

Paul Ernst Klee was born on December 18, 1879, in Münchenbuchsee near Bern, Switzerland, to Hans Wilhelm Klee, a German music teacher, and Ida Maria Frick, a Swiss-trained singer.

He had one older sister, Mathilde, born in 1876. The family moved to Bern in 1880, where Klee spent most of his childhood. He showed early talent in both music and drawing, initially pursuing violin studies before committing to visual art.

Klee completed secondary education at the Literarschule in Bern, then moved to Munich in 1898 to study at Heinrich Knirr’s private drawing school. He later enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, under Franz von Stuck.

Between 1901 and 1902, he traveled to Italy to study classical and Renaissance art. Though born in Switzerland, he held German citizenship through his father until 1939. His religious background was Protestant, but he was not actively religious.

Career

Paul Klee began his career as a draftsman and etcher, producing finely detailed, often satirical illustrations in the early 1900s. His first solo exhibition in 1910 featured over 50 works, mostly ink drawings.

A pivotal 1911 meeting with Wassily Kandinsky and membership in Der Blaue Reiter group exposed him to avant-garde ideas. His 1914 trip to Tunisia with August Macke and Louis Moilliet sparked a breakthrough in color theory—he famously wrote, “Color and I are one.”

By the late 1910s, Klee developed his signature style of poetic abstraction, blending geometric forms, musical rhythms, and childlike imagery.

In 1921, Walter Gropius invited Klee to join the Bauhaus faculty in Weimar, where he taught until 1931, first in stained glass and bookbinding, then in the weaving workshop and free painting classes.

His Pedagogical Sketchbook (1925) became a cornerstone of design education.

Despite Nazi persecution forcing his departure from Germany in 1933, Klee returned to Bern and produced some of his most prolific and emotionally charged works, including Death and Fire (1940).

The Nazis labeled his art “degenerate,” removing over 100 pieces from German museums.

Klee’s final years were marked by illness—scleroderma, diagnosed in 1935—but he painted at an extraordinary pace, completing 1,253 works in 1940 alone.

His legacy endures through major museum collections worldwide, including the Paul Klee Foundation in Bern.

His fusion of intellect, intuition, and visual invention continues to inspire generations of artists, designers, and educators.

Social Media

• Paul Klee has no social media accounts.

Personal Life

Paul Klee married Lily Stumpf, a Bavarian pianist, in 1906 after a long engagement. Their only child, Felix Paul Klee, was born in 1907 and later became an art historian and custodian of his father’s estate.

The family lived modestly in Munich and later Weimar during Klee’s Bauhaus years. Klee was a private man who enjoyed playing violin, writing poetry, and keeping diaries.

He maintained close friendships with Kandinsky, Marc, and other modernists. Forced to flee Nazi Germany in 1933, he settled in Bern, where he lived quietly until his death from scleroderma complications on June 29, 1940.

Net Worth

Paul Klee’s net worth remains unknown due to the absence of reliable financial records from his lifetime.

During his career, he earned income through art sales, teaching salaries at the Bauhaus, and occasional illustration work. While some modern websites speculate figures in the millions based on today’s auction values of his paintings, no contemporary documentation supports such estimates.