Max Pechstein

Max Pechstein - Seated Nude - 1910 - Oil on canvas - Nationalgalerie, Berlin (click photo for larger image)Painter and printmaker Hermann Max Pechstein (1881-1955) is most known for his nudes and landscapes. Pechstein was a leading member of the first phase of German Expressionism known as Die Brücke (The Bridge). 

Earlier in his career he was working in an impressionist style. However, his association with the members of Die Brücke and his exposure to the works of Henri Matisse (1869-1954) led Pechstein to begin to use vigorous brush strokes and jarring combinations of unmixed colors. In 1908 Pechstein moved from Dresden to settle in Berlin, where he showed his work at the Berliner Sezession, an exhibiting society, the following year. In 1910 he became one of the founders of the Neue Sezession (“New Secession”), an association of artists who disagreed with the policies of the Sezession.

Pechstein was also a prolific printmaker, producing 421 lithographs, 315 woodcuts and linocuts, and 165 intaglio prints—primarily etchings. 

Pechstein was a professor at the Berlin Academy for ten years, as well, before his dismissal by the Nazis in 1933. He was reinstated in 1945, and subsequently won numerous titles and awards for his work.