Page 10: Paula Modersohn-Becker, detail of cat

First published on the occasion of the exhibition

‘Making Modernism: Paula Modersohn-Becker, Käthe Kollwitz, Gabriele Münter, Marianne Werefkin’

Royal Academy of Arts, London 12 November 2022 – 12 February 2023

Supported by

With additional support from

Catalogue supported by

This exhibition has been made possible by the provision of insurance through the Government Indemnity Scheme. The Royal Academy of Arts would like to thank HM Government for providing Government Indemnity and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and Arts Council England for arranging the indemnity.

EXHIBITION CURATORS

Dorothy Price Sarah Lea assisted by Rhiannon Hope and Sylvie Broussine

EXHIBITION MANAGEMENT

Rebecca Bailey assisted by Florence Mytum

PHOTOGRAPHIC AND COPYRIGHT CO-ORDINATION

Giulia Ariete and Susana Vázquez Fernández

EXHIBITION CATALOGUE

Royal Academy Publications Florence Dassonville, Production and Distribution Co-ordinator Imogen Greenhalgh, Project Editor Carola Krueger, Production and Distribution Manager Peter Sawbridge, Head of Publishing and Editorial Director

Design: Kathrin Jacobsen Copyright © 2022 Royal Academy of Arts, London

Any copy of this book issued by the publisher is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including these words being imposed on a subsequent purchaser.

All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

British Library Cataloguing-inPublication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978-1-912520-90-9

Distributed outside the United States and Canada by ACC Art Books Ltd, Sandy Lane, Old Martlesham, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 4SD

Distributed in the United States and Canada by ARTBOOK | D.A.P., 75 Broad Street, Suite 630, New York, NY 10004

EDITORIAL NOTE

Dimensions of all works of art are given in centimetres, height before width.

ILLUSTRATIONS

Front cover: Gabriele Münter, detail of cat. 46 Back cover: Paula Modersohn-Becker, detail of cat. 14 Pages 2–3: Marianne Werefkin, detail of cat. 54 Page 6: Käthe Kollwitz, detail of cat. 21 Page 9: Gabriele Münter, detail of cat. 44 Page 10: Paula Modersohn-Becker, detail of cat. 2 Page 13: Jacoba van Heemskerck, detail of cat. 65 Pages 42–43: Gabriele Münter, detail of cat. 42 Page 45: fig. 26 Page 69: fig. 27 Page 89: fig. 28 Page 109: fig. 29 Page 129: fig. 30 Page 135: fig. 31 Page 150: fig. 32

Contents

Ambassador’s Foreword President’s Foreword Sponsor’s Preface Acknowledgements

The Making of Modernism in Imperial Germany

Dorothy Price

‘To be a painter is to be alive’

Chantal Joffe RA in conversation with Dorothy Price

Making a Name: A Sturm Exhibition of Jacoba van Heemskerck and Marianne Werefkin, March 1914

Shulamith Behr

Catalogue plates with artists’ biographies by Sarah Lea

Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876–1907)

Käthe Kollwitz (1867–1945)

Gabriele Münter (1877–1962)

Marianne Werefkin (1860–1938)

Ottilie Reylaender (1882–1965)

Jacoba van Heemskerck (1876–1923)

Erma Bossi (1875–1952)

Timeline

Rhiannon Hope

Endnotes Further Reading Lenders to the Exhibition Photographic Acknowledgements Index

7

8

11

12

14

26

34

44

68

88

108

128

134

140

147

156

161

162

162

163

President’s Foreword

‘Making Modernism’ brings together the work of seven artists active in Germany during the first decades of the twentieth century: Paula Modersohn-Becker, Käthe Kollwitz, Gabriele Münter, Marianne Werefkin, Ottilie Reylaender, Erma Bossi and Jacoba van Heemskerck. Some knew one another as friends, others as co-exhibitors; some never met, but may have heard of each other through mutual acquaintances. They do not belong to a coherent artistic movement, but all are linked to the phenomenon we call Expressionism, which stems from an individualist philosophy. Each produced an oeuvre that warrants a monographic exhibition to explore it, and these seven represent only a tiny fraction of the women who were creating and exhibiting pioneering art around the turn of the century.

The Royal Academy has long had an interest in mounting exhibitions on German Expressionism. The often-fragile nature of this experimental work – greatly in demand for exhibition – means that survey shows are ever more difficult to achieve. Over the past decade, much energy has gone into projects that have regrettably remained unrealised, and we here acknowledge the expertise and commitment of the late Dr Frank Whitford and of Dr Jill Lloyd, who each conceived impressive visions for reassessing the period.

The Academy must also acknowledge that in the past it has overlooked women artists. Although Paula Modersohn-Becker and Käthe Kollwitz were represented in ‘German Art in the Twentieth Century’ (1985), Marianne Werefkin and Gabriele Münter were not: Münter’s presence in the catalogue is limited to her photographs of the artistic circle within which she and Werefkin were key players. Indeed, it was from Werefkin’s ‘pink salon’, where avant-garde artists, gallerists and patrons exchanged ideas when passing through Munich, that many currents of international modernism flowed.

We are delighted to have collaborated with lead curator and specialist Professor Dorothy Price to create ‘Making Modernism’, an exhibition that presents women artists on their own terms. We sincerely thank Professor Price for her rigorous concept, her insightful selection of works and her engaging catalogue essay, and we thank the University of Bristol and the Courtauld Institute of Art for supporting her commitment to the project.

The intent in bringing these particular stories into focus is to introduce the range and quality of these artists, whose work the UK public has had little opportunity to view, and to see familiar modernist subjects anew through a distinctly female gaze. Aesthetic innovations and concepts, together with common themes and narratives hitherto submerged by a prevailing masculine tradition of modernism, can be appreciated as deliberate and self-determined. The 68 works gathered here – many presented in the UK for the first time – open a series of doors that we hope will lead to further exploration of these artists and their peers.

To share these exceptional works of art with visitors is an act of great generosity on the part of their owners. We thank all lenders to the exhibition, and we owe a special debt of gratitude to the Paula-Modersohn-Becker-Stiftung and the Kunsthalle Bremen, the Käthe Kollwitz Museum Köln, the Gabriele Münter- und Johannes Eichner-Stiftung, Munich, and the Fondazione Marianne Werefkin, Museo Comunale d’Arte Moderna, Ascona, and the Collection of the Municipality of Ascona, together with the Schloßmuseum Murnau, and the Kunstmuseum Den Haag. We are immensely grateful for the support of many individuals, including Wolfgang Werner, Simone Ewald, Christoph Grunenberg, Hannelore Fischer, Katharina Koselleck, Isabelle Jansen, Matthias Mühling, Daniel Koep, Sandra Uhrig, Mara Folini and Martina Mazzotta.

We also thank Tim Marlow, former Artistic Director, and Axel Rüger, Secretary and Chief Executive, for programming the exhibition, and Andrea Tarsia, Director of Exhibitions, and Dr Adrian Locke, Chief Curator, for their unwavering support and guidance. The selection has been developed in close collaboration with Sarah Lea and Anna Testar, Curators, and Rhiannon Hope, Assistant Curator. We thank Rebecca Bailey and Florence Mytum, who have steered this project to success through their expert management despite changes wrought by Brexit and Covid, and Susana Vázquez Fernández and Giulia Ariete for overseeing photographic rights and reproduction.

We thank Dr Shulamith Behr for sharing her knowledge and expertise in this handsome exhibition catalogue, which has been produced by the Academy’s dedicated publishing department, and we are especially grateful to Chantal Joffe RA for taking time out from her studio to explore the importance of these artists.

The exhibition has been designed by Ian Gardner of ILK. Ltd with graphics by Natalia de Wilde and lighting designed by ZNA Studio.

We extend our deepest gratitude to our exhibition supporters BNP Paribas, and to the Huo Family Foundation, The Tavolozza Foundation, and the International Music and Art Foundation for their additional support.

Rebecca Salter PRA President, Royal Academy of Arts

Catalogue

2

Paula Modersohn-Becker, Girl with Child, 1902 Oil on cardboard, 45.3 x 50.5 cm Kunstmuseum Den Haag, The Hague. Inv. no. 0333459

3

(opposite) Paula Modersohn-Becker, Seated Old Woman with a Cat, 1904 Oil tempera on cardboard, 73.3 x 57.8 cm Kunsthalle Emden. Inv. no. 1986/57

23

Käthe Kollwitz, Love Scene I, c. 1909–10 Crayon on Ingres laid paper, 48.8 x 62 cm Käthe Kollwitz Museum Köln. Cat. Rais. NT 561

24

Käthe Kollwitz Lovers Nestling Against Each Other, 1909–10 Charcoal on Ingres laid paper, 56 x 48.2 cm Käthe Kollwitz Museum Köln. Cat. Rais. NT 559

46

Gabriele Münter Still-life on the Tram (After Shopping), c. 1912 Oil on cardboard, 50.2 x 34.3 cm Gabriele Münter- und Johannes Eichner-Stiftung, Munich Inv. no. S 44

47

Gabriele Münter Still-life with Mirror, 1913 Oil on canvas, 60.9 x 45 cm Gabriele Münter- und Johannes Eichner-Stiftung, Munich Inv. no. S 113