Willem Hendrik Gispen artwork • painting • previously for sale A woman, reading in an interior

Willem Hendrik Gispen has become known to the general public as the designer of the tubular steel furniture that he began to design and produce in the 1920s. The breakthrough for this furniture came in 1929, when Gispen was commissioned to provide the Rotterdam Van Nelle factory with office furniture. What many do not know is that from 1913 to 1916 he studied painting and drawing at the Academie voor Beeldende KUnsten en Technische Wetenschappen, the predecessor of the Willem de Kooning Academie in Rotterdam. His small, painted oeuvre includes landscapes, cityscapes and still lifes, both abstract and figurative. In addition, Gispen designed posters.