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| Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman | |
|---|---|
| Name | Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman |
| Birth date | 3 April 1882 |
| Birth place | Elburg |
| Death date | 10 April 1945 |
| Death place | Haren |
| Nationality | Netherlands |
| Occupation | printer, typographer, painter, publisher |
Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman was a Dutch printer and artist known for innovative experimental printing, typographic play, and resistance publishing during World War II. He combined influences from De Stijl, Expressionism, and avant‑garde printing to produce the magazine De Ploeg and clandestine editions that challenged Nazi Germany censorship. Werkman's work influenced postwar printmaking and graphic design movements across Europe.
Werkman was born in Elburg and raised in the province of Gelderland before moving to Groningen, where he trained in the family printing business and received informal artistic instruction. He encountered publications from Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris, Munich and engaged with periodicals such as De Stijl, Der Sturm, Blauer Reiter and Vogue that circulated across Netherlands and Germany. Early contacts included printers and typographers in Rotterdam, Leeuwarden, and with travelling artists from Belgium, England, Sweden and Denmark who frequented Groningen.
Werkman became associated with the Groningen artists' group De Ploeg alongside painters, sculptors, and designers from the northern Netherlands. Within De Ploeg he interacted with members linked to Expressionism, Constructivism, and international circles like Der Sturm and Bauhaus practitioners. His friendships and exchanges involved figures connected to Piet Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg, Bart van der Leck, Karel Colnot and other leading modernists who shaped debates in Amsterdam, Paris, Berlin, and Moscow. Through exhibitions at venues such as the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Gemeentemuseum Den Haag, and regional galleries in Groningen he tested color, composition, and print techniques that merged painting and typography.
Werkman operated a commercial shop, the Drukkers‑Werkman press, producing jobbing work, posters, and avant‑garde prints for clients across Netherlands and Germany. He experimented with the handpress and tabletop printing methods derived from traditional techniques used by printers in Leiden, Haarlem, and Utrecht. These experiments included typographic collages, color overlays, and the “druksel” process that juxtaposed found type from Bodoni and Fournier inspired faces with manual inking reminiscent of Japanese woodblock textures promoted in Paris salons. The shop connected him to collectors, galleries, and publishing houses such as Uitgeverij, regional journals, and the international network servicing avant‑garde magazines.
Werkman produced issues of the Groningen magazine De Ploeg and later his mimeographed series under the English‑titled The Next Call, blending typography, visual poetry, and printing experiments. His typographic play invoked references to historic typefounders like William Caslon, John Baskerville, Giambattista Bodoni, and contemporaries in Germany and United Kingdom engaged in experimental typography. He used instruments and supplies from Linotype, Monotype, and letterpress workshops, reassembling letters and ornaments into avant‑garde layouts resonant with ideas circulating in Zurich, Prague, Vienna, and Barcelona periodicals. These publications circulated among artists, writers, and intellectuals linked to Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, El Lissitzky, Kurt Schwitters and readers in London, New York, and Copenhagen.
Werkman taught and collaborated with local artists, typographers, and students who later worked in printing and graphic design across Netherlands and internationally. His circle included contacts with figures associated with Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Groningen Museum, regional academies, and practitioners who later joined institutions such as Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten, Royal College of Art, and Bauhaus-influenced workshops. He influenced postwar designers working at companies tied to AkzoNobel, Philips, and regional publishing houses, and his methods were discussed at conferences and exhibitions alongside names like Jan van Krimpen, Pieter Brattinga, Wim Crouwel, and H.N. Werkman's contemporaries in the European avant‑garde.
During World War II Werkman used his press to produce clandestine materials opposing Nazi occupation of the Netherlands and collaborated with resistance networks linked to underground publishers and cultural figures in Groningen and Amsterdam. Arrested by Gestapo forces in 1944, he was detained in Assen and executed by firing squad near Haren in April 1945 alongside other resistance members. His death resonated in postwar reconstruction debates and memorialization efforts by institutions such as Rijksmuseum, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, and regional museums, and his name became a symbol in publications documenting cultural resistance in Europe.
Works by Werkman are held in major collections and museums including the Rijksmuseum, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Groninger Museum, Museum of Modern Art, Victoria and Albert Museum, Tate Modern, Smithsonian American Art Museum, and regional archives in Groningen and Haarlem. Retrospectives and exhibitions have been organized at venues like the Stedelijk Museum, De Pont, Kunsthal Rotterdam, and international festivals of graphic arts in Bologna, Basel, Venice, and New York, and his prints are studied in academic programs at University of Amsterdam, University of Groningen, and art schools across Europe.
Category:Dutch printers Category:Dutch artists Category:People executed by Nazi Germany in the Netherlands