Ernst Ludwig Kirchner – co-founder of the Dresden Bridge

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner is not among the most famous German painters today, although the important painter and graphic artist was one of the founding members of our most important expressionist artists' group, the Dresden Brücke .

Kirchner was born on May 6, 1880, and grew up in an educated household with a focus on natural sciences; his artistic inclinations were initially to be pursued through architectural studies, which he completed in Munich and Dresden.

But even during his studies, Kirchner had taken art lessons at the Debschitz School in Munich ; his acquaintances at the innovative and reform-oriented art school probably contributed to Kirchner's decision to reject the profession of architect immediately after graduating.

He reaffirmed his decision to pursue a life as an artist on June 7, 1905, when he founded the artists' group "Brücke" . A short time later, the friends were joined by Emil Nolde , Max Pechstein , and Cuno Amiet . During this period, Kirchner continued his studies and, under the influence of his more highly trained friends, developed from an Impressionist-influenced painter into a true Expressionist .

He painted landscapes, cityscapes, and scenes from the world of vaudeville, but above all, he repeatedly painted people, in portraits and nudes. From 1909, “Dodo” (Doris Große) was his lover and model; he shared the child model “Fränzi” (Lina Franziska Fehrmann) with Heckel and Pechstein.

Because success in Dresden was slow in coming, Kirchner moved to Berlin in 1911, which initially didn't improve the situation much. However, it did his paintings a favor: he used colors more cautiously, so the paintings were less "luminous," his brushstrokes became more decisive, and the rounded forms became more angular.

He also said goodbye to the simple rural motifs and turned to the first street scenes; such images suited the big city and were well received.

Later that year, he participated in an exhibition in Berlin with other artists from the Brücke group, organized by the New Secession under the direction of his friend Max Pechstein. At the end of 1911, Pechstein and Kirchner also founded a painting school, the Institute for Modern Instruction in Painting, which, however, met with little success.

When Kirchner then overemphasized his own importance in a self-written chronicle of the Brücke in 1913, according to the other members, a dispute arose, Kirchner resigned and the group dissolved.

He now traveled with his newly acquired partner, Erna Schilling, and, as in 1908, spent the summers of 1912 to 1914 on Fehmarn , where he created unforgettable coastal paintings. Approximately one-tenth of his total oil paintings were created during these summer stays, along with countless drawings and several sculptures.

Then the First World War began. Kirchner immediately volunteered, but suffered a nervous breakdown and became addicted to medication, including morphine. Posterity owes this horror of war a wonderful, five-part mural cycle , which Kirchner created in the sanatorium in 1916.

Up to this point, Kirchner had not been able to earn any money with his art; his first stays in sanatoriums were financed by patrons, and the self-portraits from this period (“The Drinker”, “Self-Portrait as a Soldier”) show his despair.

However, the triptych of the Bathing Women and other large-format paintings were shown in exhibitions of the Jena Art Association by patrons from 1914 onwards; in Berlin, Erna Schilling worked for him and, through her sales successes, created the basis for Kirchner's financial independence and fame.

Kirchner himself went to Switzerland in 1917 to seek treatment for his drug addiction , which was accompanied by paralysis. With the support of Dr. Lucius Spengler, his wife, and his own iron will, he was declared cured in 1921. A relatively stable period of his life followed, and from around this time onward, Kirchner's art also enjoyed steady recognition within avant-garde circles.

The painter himself, however, became increasingly eccentric . He felt insufficiently appreciated by critics, restricted the reproduction of his works, wrote reviews of his art under a pseudonym, and generally behaved more and more like a difficult person. He wanted to impose unequal contractual conditions on business partners, he was exceptionally distrustful, and Kirchner could become truly angry if someone called him an Expressionist or referred to his affiliation with Die Brücke.

As Kirchner increasingly suffered from the cold Swiss winters, he left Switzerland in 1925 for several visits to Germany. He was received with great admiration in Germany, but the hoped-for professorship at an art academy did not materialize.

Around 1925, his style underwent another fundamental change; Kirchner's painting became increasingly planar, culminating in a highly abstract style by the end of the 1920s. In 1927, he wrote about the "new Kirchner" project, in which, unlike some of his Brücke friends, he significantly evolved his style once again:

…but I'll put up another new Kirchner. Art is constant transformation, and growing old in a familiar pattern is craft, not art.”

Thus, his later years are characterized by a surprising diversity of styles , revealing an unbroken spirit of experimentation; abstraction receded somewhat towards the end of his life, and representational pictorial compositions with expressive plays of light and shadow characterize his last works.

Where this development would have led will always remain hidden from us, because the rise to power of the National Socialists brought his artistic development to an end: Kirchner was expelled from the Prussian Academy of Arts in 1937, over 600 of his works were removed from German museums, a selection of which were exhibited as “degenerate art” .

Kirchner subsequently returned to Switzerland and shot himself on June 15, 1938. Most art historians saw Kirchner's deep disappointment with the treatment he received in Germany as the motive for his suicide ; more recent studies suggest the cause lay in his morphine addiction, which had resurfaced in 1933.

Others consider it cynical to ask whether the atrocities of the National Socialists led to a relapse of his addiction or directly to his suicide. In any case, Kirchner demonstrates his kind of bitter humor when he leaves the painting "Sheep Herd" (1938) on the easel before taking his own life.

The complete works of the painter, graphic artist and sculptor Ernst Ludwig Kirchner were honored, for example, by the Städel Museum in Frankfurt from April 23 to August 8, 2010, with what was then the first retrospective in Germany in 30 years, comprising 170 works.

Hans-Joachim Müller, editor of “Die Welt”, wrote the following about this exhibition on April 26, 2010:

“AN EVENT: THE RETROSPECTIVE AT THE STÄDEL IN FRANKFURT SHOWS ERNST LUDWIG KIRCHNER AS WE HAVE NEVER SEEN HIM BEFORE.”

You can get a small impression of this great and extraordinary retrospective