Plate 17 from Futurists, Abstractionists, Dadaists: the Forerunners of the Avant-Garde, vol. I

Hans Richter was a German-Swiss painter, filmmaker, and theorist who pioneered abstract animation in the 1920s by treating the canvas and film screen as equivalent spaces for temporal exploration. His geometric abstract films, including Rhythmus 21, established experimental cinema as a serious artistic medium through rhythmic movement and kinetic form. Working across painting, collage, and film, Richter bridged Dada, constructivism, and modernist abstraction while developing influential pedagogical methods that shaped post-war art education and theory.