Expressionism: Characteristics, Artists and Key Works

Expressionism is an art movement of the early twentieth century in which the artist portrays inner experience rather than the visible world. The colours are strong and often unrealistic, the lines angular and the subjects distorted to heighten anxiety, tension or joy of life.

Facts

From impression to expression

The Impressionists wanted to capture what the eye sees, but the Expressionists wanted to capture what the soul feels. The models already existed in the nineteenth century: Vincent van Gogh with his twisting brushstrokes, James Ensor with his masks and above all Edvard Munch. His The Scream of 1893 shows a figure on a bridge under a blood-red sky, and it is perhaps the image that more than any other stands for modern anxiety.

The word Expressionism came into use around 1911 in Germany, first for painters who worked in a new way and then as a collective name. It came to cover not only painting but also prints, sculpture, literature, theatre and film. A well-known example is the film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari of 1920 with its slanting sets.

Die Brücke and Der Blaue Reiter

In 1905 four architecture students in Dresden formed the group Die Brücke, the Bridge, with the painters Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Erich Heckel and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. They painted nudes in nature and city scenes in harsh colours and sharp outlines, and they revived the woodcut. Emil Nolde was a member for a short time and became known for his glowing colours and flowers.

In Munich in 1911 another circle gathered around Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc under the name Der Blaue Reiter, the Blue Rider. They were less concerned with the unrest of the big city and more with the spiritual power of colour; Marc painted animals in symbolic colours and Kandinsky moved towards the abstract, as in Composition VII. Read more in the guide to abstract art.

Austria, women artists and the North

In Vienna Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka painted thin, nervous figures with sharp lines and a psychological seriousness that had no equal at the time. Käthe Kollwitz used etching, lithography and sculpture to depict poverty, grief and war, and she is often counted among the Expressionists even though she stood outside the groups.

In Sweden the exhibition by the group De unga in 1909 attracted attention. Isaac Grünewald and his wife Sigrid Hjertén brought home lessons from Henri Matisse in Paris and painted in strong, flat colours, as in Hjertén's Studio Interior. In Hjertén's work the colours were often even bolder than among her colleagues.

Banned and rediscovered

After the First World War the style continued in new forms, among them Neue Sachlichkeit, the New Objectivity, which was cooler and more merciless. When the Nazis came to power in 1933 Expressionism was branded “degenerate”. In 1937 they organised the exhibition Entartete Kunst in Munich, where works by Nolde, Kirchner and Marc, among others, were shown in order to mock them, and many artists were forbidden to paint.

After 1945 Expressionism was rediscovered, and it later influenced Abstract Expressionism in New York. Read also how it differs from its opposite in the guide to Impressionism and Expressionism and about Symbolism, which was close in time.

How to recognise it

Exercise

Which group was formed in Dresden in 1905 and is usually counted as the first Expressionist group?