Christian Rohlfs | |
|---|---|
 Christian Rohlfs, self-portrait (1918) | |
| Born | Christian Rohlfs 22 November 1849 |
| Died | 8 January 1938 |
| Nationality | German |
Christian Rohlfs (November 22, 1849 - January 8, 1938) was a German painter and printmaker, one of the important representatives ofGermanexpressionism.
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He was born inGroß Niendorf,Kreis Segeberg inPrussia. He took up painting as a teenager while convalescing from an infection[1] that was eventually to lead to the amputation of a leg in 1874.[2] He began his formal artistic education in Berlin,[2] before transferring, in 1870, to the Weimar Academy.[1]
In 1901 Rohlfs left Weimar forHagen, where through the architectHenri van der Velde got to know the art collectorKarl Ernst Osthaus who offered him a studio in an estate which would become theMuseum Folkwang.[3] Rohlfs was the first artist to begin to work there.[3] Meetings withEdvard Munch andEmil Nolde and the experience of seeing the works ofVincent van Gogh inspired him to move towards the expressionist style, in which he would work for the rest of his career.[1]
In 1908, at the age of 60, he made his first prints after seeing an exhibition of works by the expressionist groupDie Brücke. He went on to make 185 in total, almost allwoodcuts orlinocuts.[1] He lived in Munich and the Tyrol in 1910–12, before returning to Hagen.[citation needed]. The outbreak ofWorld War I worried Rohlfs such, that for some time he felt unable to paint.[3] In rare instances he experimented with heavily hand-coloring his prints, onto the verge of painting and sometimes well after they were made, as in his 1919 recoloring of the prior year'sDer Gefangene.[4]
In May 1922 he attended theInternational Congress of Progressive Artists and signed the "Founding Proclamation of the Union of Progressive International Artists".[5] In 1937 the Nazis expelled him from thePrussian Academy of Arts, condemned his work asdegenerate, and removed his works from public collections.[1] Seventeen of his paintings were exhibited in theDegenerate Art Exhibition in 1937.[3] He died inHagen,Westfalia, on 8 January 1938.[3]
Throughout his career he working through a variety of academic, naturalist,impressionist, and Post-Impressionist styles.[6] He has often been viewed as one of the first Expressionists.[3]
After his death, the German Nazi authorities prohibited the sale of his paintings.[3] Commemorative exhibitions were organized by theKunstmuseum Basel and theBerner Kunsthalle.[3]
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