Werth, Kurt

Kurt Werth was born September 21, 1896 in Leipzig, Germany. He studied at the Academy for Graphic Arts in Leipzig and later worked as a book and magazine illustrator in Germany. With the rise of Nazism in the 1930s, Kurt Werth left Germany and came to the United States where he did magazine and text book illustrations. He became a United States citizen in 1947 and that same year he illustrated his first book for children, Rosemary Sprague's Northward to Albion . During his long and prolific career, Kurt Werth illustrated dozens of books for children and young adults including folk and fairy tales, biographies, and many works of fiction. In 1965, he published his first illustrated retelling of a folk tale, The Valiant Tailor . Early in his career, Kurt Werth had been influenced by "Rembrandt, Daumier, and Slevogt" but later "changed to a more expressive and modern approach." Kurt Werth died on August 25, 1983 in New York City.

Biographical Source: Something About the Author, vol. 20, pp. 213-215.

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