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Hugo Curt Herrmann (1 February 1854 – 13 September 1929) was a GermanImpressionist andNeo-Impressionist painter; associated with theBerlin Secession.
He was born inMerseburg, in thePrussianProvince of Saxony (nowSaxony-Anhalt). His father was an insurance executive. When Hermann was sixteen, his family moved to Berlin. Three years later, he left school without graduating and found a position in the studios ofCarl Steffeck. Although he was primarily interested in painting portraits, he also spent some time with the history painterWilhelm von Lindenschmit at theAcademy of Fine Arts, Munich. In 1885, he set up as a portrait painter in Munich and befriended the art criticRichard Muther.
In 1893, he moved to Berlin, where he opened a drawing and painting school for women. Four years later, he married Sophie Herz (1872–1931), one of his students. On his honeymoon in Paris, he met and befriendedHenry van de Velde, who introduced him to Neo-Impressionism and later decorated his apartment in Berlin. In 1898, he became one of the founding members of theBerlin Secession and sat on its advisory board. He operated his school intermittently until 1903, when he joined theDeutscher Künstlerbund.
In Germany, he maintained contact withPaul Signac,Théo van Rysselberghe andMaurice Denis and, in 1902, was instrumental in convincingPaul Cassirer to display them at his gallery. Four years later, he organized an exhibition of modern French artists presented by the Secession. When the Secession split in 1914, he joined the newFree Secession and served as its president from then until 1918. He also worked to promote younger artists, such asArthur Segal,Alexej von Jawlensky,Adolf Erbslöh and others associated withDie Brücke. He was named a Professor at theRoyal Academy of Arts in 1917.
After the war, he abandoned Berlin and lived at amanor house inPretzfeld that was owned by his mother-in-law. His work became increasingly abstract and, in 1923, he fell into a deep depression and gave up painting. The following year, at the request of art historianRichard Hamann, he was presented with an honorary doctorate by theUniversity of Marburg. He made lengthy visits to a spa inErlangen for treatment and died there in 1929.
In 1938, theNazis razed the manor house and publicly burned one of his early paintings (A Boyish Act) on the grounds that it was immoral. By that time, his family had already fled to England.
