Further down, behind the village, a wide expanse of ice opens up, where life suddenly seems lively and playful. Children pull sledges, adults skate, someone falls, someone else carries goods across the ice.

Bruegel's Hunters in the Snow shows winter at that time in all its harshness. But also as a world of its own, in which social life took place.

In the mid-16th century, winters were exceptionally cold – much colder than we experience today in Central Europe. Rivers froze over for weeks or even months. Canals and lakes became so reliably frozen that they could be crossed by carts. In the Netherlands, where canals and waterways crisscross the entire country, the water network was transformed in winter into an extensive network of ice roads.

Winter became a season that determined everything: food, work, trade, mobility. Food in particular was a constant battle against scarcity. Supplies had to last until spring, and that was by no means guaranteed. The cold had far-reaching consequences for agriculture and the economy. Crop failures were more frequent, growing seasons were shorter, and some regions suffered from recurring famines.

But for people, the frozen state of the landscape was not merely an obstacle. When the waterways froze over, new routes emerged. Markets were held on frozen lakes, which enlivened community life in unexpected ways. Ice skating, sled races, other games and competitions became part of village life, which would not have been possible without the stable ice.

All this made winter, despite its severity, a social season. Pieter Bruegel the Elder's Hunters in the Snow captures with extraordinary insight how deeply winter affected people's lives.

Bruegel's Hunters in the Snow: A Village Frozen in Winter

Bruegel created the painting in 1565 for Nicolaes Jonghelinck, a wealthy Antwerp art collector and financial administrator. Jonghelinck owned several works by Bruegel and commissioned a series of large-format monthly paintings for his country house. These depicted the seasons, rural life and everyday human existence in harmony with the rhythms of nature. Originally, there were six panels, each covering two months. Hunters in the Snow represents December/January.

The paintings are all approximately 120 × 160 cm in size and are said to have hung all around Jonghelinck's dining room. The sight must have been magnificent for his guests.

Today, only five panels remain, three of which, namely Gloomy Day (early spring), Return of the Herd (autumn) and Hunters in the Snow (winter), are in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Early Summer, The Hay Harvest, can be seen in Prague at the Lobkowicz Palace in Prague Castle, while Late Summer, The Corn Harvest, is owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Spring was probably lost as early as the 17th 

Hunters in the Snow is considered the best known of these monthly paintings and one of the most famous winter paintings in art history. It is the most atmospheric work in the series. The contrast between the exhausted homecoming in the foreground and the lively activity on the ice, the mixture of austerity and liveliness, immediately catches the eye.

But the real reason why this painting has become an iconic work lies in the way Bruegel guides the viewer's gaze, how he constructs space and how he combines the everyday with incredible narrative depth.

What makes the painting special is its viewpoint. Bruegel raises the horizon extremely high and allows us to look down on the landscape from a slope, as it were. We are not in the middle of the action, but neither are we far enough away to be detached. We are observers – much like Bruegel himself.

This composition forces our gaze in a clear direction. From the dark figures in the foreground, the hunters, and the dogs, it glides down to the bright village, continues across the ice and finally to the distant mountains. Many art historians therefore describe this painting as one of the most sophisticated examples of visual guidance in the Dutch Renaissance.

And then there are the details! You get the feeling that every little spot in the painting tells a little story: the man slipping on the ice, the woman gathering brushwood on the bridge, children playing with sledges, women by the fire, the lonely bird on the bare tree.

Behind the church, you can see a building with smoke rising from it. A group of people seem to be trying to extinguish the fire or save what can still be saved. On the other side of the river, a figure is carrying a long ladder across the ice. He is probably heading for the burning house.

Winter fires were a real danger, and attempts to extinguish them were desperate because the water was frozen.

Beyond the large ice surface, a lone hunter shoots at birds, possibly ducks. If you look closely, you can even see the gunfire.

And on the ice, there are several groups of children who are not only pulling sledges, but also playing with iron tyres, sticks, or round discs – some of which are games that are hardly comprehensible today.
Bruegel documents folk culture here.

Despite its richness, the picture does not appear overloaded. Everything fits together harmoniously. The tranquillity, the winter silence, is preserved. Bruegel's art is an invitation to look closely.

Involuntary Climate Chronicler

In the mid-16th century, winters were not just particularly cold; there was a period that we now refer to as the Little Ice Age. Roughly speaking, it began in the 13th century and lasted until around the end of the 19th century, but it reached its peak during Bruegel's lifetime.

Geographically, the Little Ice Age mainly affected Europe, North America and parts of Asia. It was particularly noticeable in Northern Europe: in the Netherlands, present-day Belgium, Northern Germany, Scandinavia and the British Isles.

In the 16th and 17th centuries, a new form of painting developed in the Netherlands, moving away from major religious themes towards everyday life, landscapes and bourgeois life. People wanted to see paintings that reflected their own world. And in winter, this world largely took place on the ice.

Between the late 16th and 17th centuries, no other region in Europe produced as many winter landscapes as the northern Netherlands. While Italian, French and Spanish artists tended to treat winter as a marginal motif or symbolic episode, Dutch painters made it an independent, recurring theme in their work.

The country was flat, rich in water and crisscrossed by canals. When these froze over, life changed completely. Winter offered clear contrasts, graphic structures, a reduced colour palette and, at the same time, an infinite number of little stories.

Hendrick Avercamp is considered the winter painter of Dutch art, or at least the one who consistently made the winter motif his trademark. No other artist of his time dealt with winter as persistently, as comprehensively and as variably as he did.

Frozen rivers, canals, lakes, crowds of people on the ice – this is his terrain. His paintings are densely populated, detailed and cheerful.

Bruegel's Hunters in the Snow also depicts cheerfulness, but it never dominates the landscape; rather, it is always embedded within it. This makes the vulnerability of humans palpable.

This begins with the size of the landscape. The people are small, placed almost casually in this vast winter world. The space does not belong to them. The slope, the sky and the frozen surfaces take up much more visual space than the figures. Even in the foreground, it is not the hunters who dominate, but the snow, the slope, and the trees. Humans are part of this landscape, not its benchmark.

This is a crucial difference to many Italian Renaissance paintings, in which the landscape is often a stage for humans. With Bruegel, it is the other way round: humans are an episode in the space of nature.

The mountains in the background of Hunters in the Snow have no real geographical connection to the region depicted; as mentioned, the Netherlands is flat. But Bruegel was one of the few Northern European artists of his time who had seen the Alps himself. On his trip to Italy in the early 1550s, he crossed the Alps, and this experience had a lasting impact on him. These mountain landscapes reappear repeatedly in his later paintings.

In Hunters in the Snow, the mountains enlarge the space enormously. They draw the eye backwards, opening up the picture and giving it a depth that extends beyond village life. This makes the landscape seem even more powerful, even more comprehensive – and the people in it even smaller.

Then there is this barrenness. Not dramatic, silent. Hardly any foliage, bare trees, muted colours, in contrast to the crows – almost like harbingers of death. The visual restraint creates a feeling of deprivation. The world has little to offer at the moment. The fact that the hunters return almost empty-handed is not a narrative climax, it is a matter of fact.

The tavern sign hangs crookedly above the heads of the people sitting around the campfire. It is unstable, moved by the wind, not firmly anchored. It looks as if it could fall down at any moment. A small image of the uncertainty of human existence. At the same time, it shows a religious vision of hunting that has nothing to do with the reality beneath it. This, too, is vulnerability: the distance between ideal and life.

The posture of the people implies a subtle but physically palpable form of vulnerability. No one is standing upright. The hunters are bent over, the people on the ice are slipping, stumbling, balancing. Even in play, their bodies are uncertain. The ice bears their weight – but only under certain conditions. One wrong step and you fall. Nature allows movement, but it guarantees nothing.

The fire in the background is also part of this. A house catches fire while everything else is frozen. Water is there, but it cannot be used. People are dependent on elements beyond their control. Cold does not protect against disasters; it even exacerbates them. The fact that this scene is so small does not make it any less significant – on the contrary. It shows how casually existential threats could arise in everyday life.

In his painting, Bruegel documents the climate without seeking to explain or name it. Not in a scientific sense, but in an existential one. He captures how climate feels, how it shapes everyday life and how people navigate it. Not in collapse, but in constantly adapting to conditions that are greater than themselves.

Winter Wonderland

The painting, with its tranquil, snow-covered landscape and lively ice scenes, corresponds to what we associate with the Christmas spirit today, even if Bruegel himself did not have this in mind.

Since the 19th century, classic winter landscapes have been increasingly used in reproductive art. Hunters in the Snow is one of the most famous classic winter paintings in the world and is often printed on postcards and Christmas cards. A popular myth even claims that it is the most common secular Christmas card motif worldwide.

Of course, this cannot be proven. But that doesn't stop me from wishing you a Merry Christmas with this motif as well.

On the other side of the ocean, Homer is considered one of the most American artists of all time. Perhaps this is because a nation that had only begun to cross the continent in settler treks a few decades earlier recognized itself in his paintings. In the juxtaposition of human vulnerability and the threatening elemental forces of nature, which is a recurring theme in Homer's paintings.

An Artist's Life in the 19th Century

Winslow Homer was born on 24 February 1836 in Boston, Massachusetts. His father was a businessman and his mother a talented amateur watercolourist. She painted flowers and landscapes, and several of her watercolours have survived to this day. She was also the one who encouraged him to draw. She gave him his first drawing materials.

In 1854, Homer began an apprenticeship as a lithographer at J.H. Bufford's Lithography, a well-known printing company in Boston at the time. There he produced templates for advertisements, posters, and illustrated sheets. After two years, he left the company and started his own business as an illustrator in 1857. He was just 21 years old at the time.

Two years later, in 1859, Homer moved to New York, already the cultural centre of the United States at that time. This marked the beginning of a decisive phase in his career, as it was here that he became an independent artist. Winslow Homer rented a studio in the 10th Street Studio Building. Artists such as Frederic Church and Albert Bierstadt also worked there.

Civil War

He regularly contributed to Harper's Weekly, one of the most important weekly newspapers in the United States.
On 12 April 1861, Confederate troops bombarded Fort Sumter in South Carolina. The American Civil War had begun. The main triggers were the conflicts over slavery and the political balance of power between the northern and southern states.

The war lasted until 9 April 1865, when General Robert E. Lee signed the surrender of the Southern States in Appomattox, Virginia. Homer worked for Harper's Weekly throughout the four years of the war and, as their special artist, a kind of war correspondent, he travelled repeatedly to the front to sketch scenes on the ground.

He produces hundreds of drawings, which are later printed as woodcuts in the magazine. They depict camp life, soldiers in their everyday routines, battles, but in a more sober manner than the heroic images of many of his contemporaries. His realistic and unemotional style quickly makes him famous.

At the same time, Winslow Homer devoted himself increasingly to painting. His experiences during the war had a profound effect on him and later found their way into his paintings. The vulnerability of human beings in the face of violence, death, but also circumstances greater than themselves, is a recurring motif in his paintings.

In 1863, he exhibited for the first time at the National Academy of Design in New York. Anyone who exhibits there has the chance to be noticed by the public, collectors, and critics. In 1865, he was elected an associate (probationary member) and in 1867 a full member. This recognised his status as a painter.

The Academy helped to establish its own artistic tradition in the USA and not just look to Europe. This was because there was a growing awareness in the USA that they needed their own visual language to represent their country and their themes. Art should express something national, not just be a copy of the Old World.

But in the 19th century, Paris was still the centre of the art world. Anyone who wants to be internationally recognised goes there, studies at the École des Beaux-Arts, and exhibits at the Salon. Many American painters, such as Mary Cassatt and John Singer Sargent, are also strongly influenced by Europe, especially Impressionism.

In 1866, Winslow Homer travelled to Europe and spent almost a year in Paris, even exhibiting at the Salon. There he saw the works of Courbet, Manet, Millet and also the beginnings of Impressionism. Europe inspired him, but he did not import its styles.

He is not an Impressionist, but he adopts their free brushwork and interest in the moment. He shares Millet's view of the seriousness of everyday subjects, is perhaps inspired by the directness of Courbet's brushstrokes, and also sees the emphasis on the here and now. But he filters these impressions and builds something of his own from them.

In New York, his painting was still strongly influenced by Realism. But over time, and perhaps also due to the influence of Europe, he moved away from strict attention to detail. Forms became simpler, surfaces larger, brushstrokes more visible. Nevertheless, he did not become an Impressionist. His paintings appear more structured, clearer, less ‘shimmering’. In his late seascapes, his painting is almost expressive, the waves consisting of broad, energetic brushstrokes.

In literature, Homer is often described as a ‘bridge builder’ between European realism and an independent American visual language. With his later seascapes, he opened up a path towards symbolism or expressionism – thus building a bridge not only geographically (Europe–USA), but also stylistically (realism–modernism).

Reconstruction 

Homer returns from Paris in 1867. In the United States, the Reconstruction Era (1865–1877) is in full swing, a period following the Civil War during which the southern states are reintegrated into the Union and slavery is abolished.

The reality for freed African Americans is fraught with tension: legally free, but socially and economically disadvantaged. Homer addresses these issues. He observes and depicts the fractures of this period, but again without commenting on them in a simplistic manner. His portrayals of the reality of African American life are unusually sober and unclichéd for his time.

In 1876, the United States marked its centenary. While the country celebrated, Homer highlighted its unresolved contradictions. A Visit from the Old Mistress was created in the same year. In art history, it is considered a central work in his socially critical oeuvre, alongside The Cotton Pickers and Prisoners from the Front.

It depicts the encounter between a former slave owner (the ‘Old Mistress’) and a group of freed African-American women. The Black women are standing or sitting together, while the ‘old mistress’ stands opposite them. The figures seem trapped in a silent confrontation. No one looks at each other, and there is a feeling of tension and unease.

Homer shows no violence, no obvious accusation. But the body language says it all. The past has not been overcome. Freedom is fragile and social conflict unresolved.
Few white artists of his time dealt so directly with the realities of African American life.

Homer's paintings are more complex than they appear at first glance. At first, you see clear scenes, understandable motifs – everyday life, people, nature. Only at second glance do you see the symbolic power, the tensions, questions about life, death, and power relations.

Take, for example, the painting I chose as the cover image for this article. A farmer at work, right?
The title of the picture is: A Veteran in a New Field. Immediately, the experience of war resonates. The ‘new field’ is not just the wheat field, but the new life after killing.

In war, the bayonet was the man's tool. In the field, it is the scythe. It nourishes (harvests), but is also traditionally an attribute of the Grim Reaper, symbolising death. Homer plays with this ambiguity. The veteran is not completely free from war.
This is also symbolised by the partially mowed field. It shows that the former soldier has a lot behind him and a lot ahead of him that he still has to cope with, but also that it is worth working for.

The horizontal composition with sky, field, and ground is inevitably reminiscent of many national flags. This seems like a visual allusion to nation and statehood. 1865, the year the Civil War ended, and the painting was created, was the moment when the USA had to redefine itself as ‘one nation’.

A Veteran in a New Field tells of hope, of burden, of death, of new beginnings. Because it says so much about this historic moment with so few elements, it is now considered an iconic symbol of the return to civilian life.

Change of Perspective

In the 1870s and early 1880s, Winslow Homer began travelling again. Watercolours are much more convenient. With a small box and paper, he could work on the go. And so he became more involved again with the medium he had been introduced to by his mother as a child. Soon, watercolour became more than just a medium for sketching, and the practical solution turned into a real passion.

Winslow Homer developed a virtuosity in watercolour that made him one of the most important watercolourists in the United States. He exhibited watercolours for the first time in 1873, with great success. His watercolours are clear, flooded with light, often painted with surprisingly few brushstrokes. Many critics say that Homer appears most modern in his watercolours.

With his watercolours, Homer also opened up thematically. His paintings are less socio-political, depicting nature, leisure and everyday scenes. Nevertheless, the complexity remains. Behind the seemingly light-hearted scenes, one often senses the same fundamental questions: vulnerability and transience.

In the early 1880s, Winslow Homer spent almost two years in the fishing village of Cullercoats on the north-east coast of England. There he painted fishermen and their wives waiting on the shore, mending nets or carrying heavy loads.
Unlike idyllic genre paintings, he portrayed them as serious, strong and unsentimental.

In Cullercoats, the North Sea rages, rough and unpredictable. The hard life, the constant struggle with the sea, had a profound effect on him. He studied how people lived with this violence and made it a fundamental theme of his later painting: man versus nature.

However, the watercolours from Cullercoats radiate above all tranquillity. The figures often stand isolated, in simple poses, almost like silhouettes against the sea. This reduction to clear forms became typical of Homer from his time in England onwards, and had a decisive influence on his late work.

An Art Studio on the Cliffs

Even after returning to the United States, he was increasingly drawn to coastal landscapes. In 1883, he settled in Prouts Neck on the coast of Maine. He deliberately sought proximity to the sea. He converted the old family home into a studio. It is located on the cliffs, directly above the sea. He lived there from then on. For almost three decades, interrupted only by his travels to the south (Florida, the Bahamas, Cuba, Bermuda).

From his studio window and the veranda, he had an unobstructed view of the waves. He only had to step outside to feel the surf. This immediate experience is reflected in the drama and precision of his seascapes.

The coast is rocky and rugged, with cliffs dropping straight down into the Atlantic. There are few beaches here, but plenty of bare rock. The climate is often stormy, with fog, storms and heavy swells. These are precisely the dramatic conditions that inspire Homer.

He lived a secluded life, almost like a hermit. Homer never married, avoided society, and concentrated entirely on his art. His proximity to the surf allowed him to study wave movements and weather conditions in detail.

The ocean right outside his front door became his most important motif. The dramatic Atlantic coast is ever-present. Surf, cliffs, storms. Works such as The Life Line (1884) and The Gulf Stream (1899), which are now considered among his most significant works, were created right here. Nature as an overwhelming force, man small and vulnerable.
Without the rugged, rocky coast of Maine, his visual language would be almost inconceivable.

Winslow Homer died on 29 September 1910 in his studio house in Prouts Neck, Maine.
He was 74 years old.

Blind Spots

Art history has long been very Eurocentric. Museums, canons and school textbooks featured almost exclusively European men. This is slowly changing.

Artists from the USA, Latin America, Africa and Asia are also increasingly coming to the fore. Non-European art is now perceived as an independent tradition and not just a ‘precursor’ to Western modernism.

But this is still far from sufficient. Women and non-Western perspectives are still underrepresented. Although the discourse has become more inclusive, the structures (museums, academic curricula, market mechanisms) are often slow to follow suit.
Much of this still takes place in special exhibitions, with no permanent integration into the canon.

There is still a long way to go before art history is truly told in a diverse way, with all the voices and perspectives that belong to it.
Homer is a good example of this for me. An artist who is considered the founding father of American painting in the USA, in the same breath as the Hudson River School and later the Ashcan School, but who is largely unknown here.

She was not a stylistic revolutionary. Joan Mitchell did not reinvent the vocabulary of Abstract Expressionism, but she appropriated it in a very personal, emotional and often physically tangible way. Her paintings became spaces of inner perception. Nature was never merely a template, but an impulse: she did not paint landscapes, but the feeling of moving within them. She herself called it ‘remembered landscapes’.

Women have always had a hard time in the art world. They were ridiculed, marginalised, and after their death their achievements were often attributed to male colleagues. But in abstract art, the invisibilisation of female artists was systematic.

Abstract Expressionism in the USA of the 1940s and 60s was literally charged with a macho artist figure: large-format painting, physical, impulsive - this was seen as an expression of power and authenticity - and thus as masculine, although female artists also worked with vigour and gesture.

Women like Grace Hartigan, Elaine de Kooning or Helen Frankenthaler were often only visible when they were in a relationship with famous men: as a wife, muse, pupil or lover. Even Lee Krasner, a highly interesting artist, often remained ‘the wife of’ during her lifetime - in her case Jackson Pollock.

Joan Mitchell was one of the few women to hold her own in the male-dominated field of Abstract Expressionism. And she didn't do it quietly! Her works became larger, her colours bolder, her expression more uncompromising. And yet, she remained in the shadow of her male colleagues for a long time.

Just no label

Joan Mitchell was never particularly interested in being perceived as a female artist. She is even said to have once said: ‘I'm not a woman, I'm a painter’. Perhaps a little irritating from today's perspective. But what appears to be a defence against feminist attributions was actually an attempt to escape the labels of the art world at the time.

She did not want to be reduced to being a woman, to be seen as an exception or a special case - but as a serious artist. Full stop. She was aware that she still had to assert herself in a field dominated by men.

Her painting style was often described by critics as ‘masculine’. This was meant as a compliment. As if only ‘male energy’ could produce physical power. Power was seen as masculine, emotion as feminine - and both together? It wasn't meant to be like that.
Mitchell broke this mould with every brushstroke.

A life between poetry and brushes

Her father, a renowned doctor and amateur painter, had wanted a son, and he took out his disappointment on his daughter. It is even said that Mitchell was initially named 'John' on her birth certificate. Nowadays, this would be seen as an attempt to challenge binary gender roles. But back then, the message was clear: you will never fulfil my expectations.

Charles Mitchell was seen as rather cool and performance-oriented; he expected results, discipline and seriousness. The relationship between father and daughter remained distant throughout his life. Although he was a patron of the arts, he supported them more because it was part of his social position than out of passion.

Her mother, Marion Strobel, was a published poet and the editor of Poetry Magazine, as well as being a close friend of T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. She encouraged Joan to be creative, but not without expectations. In Joan Mitchell's upper-middle-class academic home in Chicago during the 1920s and '30s, creativity was probably more a cultural ideal of education. It was not authentic self-expression, but rather a sign of social standing, taste, and distinction.

Pressure and Discipline

So Joan grew up in an environment that valued literature and art, and which was characterised by high standards. She began drawing at an early age and loved poetry. She also excelled at sport as a child — she was a talented figure skater and won several prizes in show jumping as a teenager. However, the focus was always on performance.

She began studying art at the age of 19. This classical education brought her into contact with both figurative painting and modern theory. After completing her Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) and Master of Fine Arts (MFA) degrees at the Art Institute of Chicago, she moved to New York to study art history at Columbia University. She also studied French at New York University.

Own Voice

During this time, she increasingly began to move away from figurative art. Artists such as Cézanne, van Gogh and Matisse in particular characterised her view of painting. In them, she found what she herself was looking for: composition as expression, colour as emotion, landscape as remembrance.

As early as the 1950s, New York was a centre of artistic awakening, but also a shark tank. Mitchell asserted herself with raw wit, a self-confident demeanour and a style of painting that was neither tame nor hesitant. She was part of the legendary Cedar Bar circle, drank with de Kooning, debated with Franz Kline and was soon invited to the same galleries as her male colleagues.

In 1955, she had her first solo exhibition at the Stable Gallery in New York. Her work quickly attracted international attention. But New York was also a place of noise, competition and excess. Perhaps this is why Joan Mitchell regularly travelled between New York and Paris.

Paris and Riopelle

In the summer of 1955, she met the Canadian painter Jean-Paul Riopelle at a party there. A stormy, creatively intense and often turbulent relationship began. By the end of 1959, the couple moved into a shared studio apartment on Rue Frémicourt in the 15th arrondissement. An open-plan space, ideal for working on large-format paintings. They lived, worked and discussed there.

Their work influenced each other, but their relationship was also characterised by fights, alcohol, jealousy, and infidelity. In 1978, Riopelles' affair with Mitchell's assistant Hollis Jeffcoat ended their more than 20 years together. Joan Mitchell dealt with the break-up in her work La vie en rose.

Vétheuil: Retreat into the Distance

In 1968, she bought a property in Vétheuil, about 70 kilometres north-west of Paris, not far from the house where Claude Monet had lived for several years before moving to Giverny. She lived there with her dogs, her paints and her canvases.
Mitchell's estate was situated on a hill above the town, with a sweeping view of the Seine. The French landscape became the emotional backdrop to her paintings.

"Sunflowers are something I feel very intensely. They look so wonderful when young and they are so very moving when they are dying. I don’t like fields of sunflowers. I like them alone or, of course, painted by Van Gogh."

- Joan Mitchell

The language of Colour: Emotion, Remembrances, Landscape

Surrounded by trees, water and vast skies, Joan Mitchell found the freedom that she could never quite achieve in New York. In Vétheuil, her art became larger, more complex, more determined and more fragile at the same time.

The representational did not disappear, it was merely transformed: into rhythm, colour, surface. Mitchell was not a purely abstract painter in the classical sense. Her works often remained anchored in real experiences, but without depicting them. ‘My paintings only get their titles when they are finished,’ she said. ‘I paint according to the landscapes I remember and the feelings I carry with me.’
And so her works are sometimes suffused with light, sometimes drenched in pain.

For her, colour was a means of making the inexpressible visible. She spoke in colours, like others in tones or verse. She herself admired Charlie Parker and Miles Davis, but also Beethoven. Her brushstrokes often seem like improvisation, like jazz: full of energy, wild and rough.

Literature also played a major role. Mitchell read Proust and T. S. Eliot, again and again. Proust's idea of ‘mémoire involontaire’ - involuntary memory - is reflected in her paintings. It is not about a motif, but about the emotions she leaves behind. Or as she herself said: "I could never mirror nature. I would rather paint what it leaves behind in me."

The titles of her works are often quietly telling: La Grande Vallée, No Rain, Ladybug, Sunflowers. Nature dives, fragments of memories, delicate observations. La Grande Vallée, for example - a monumental series of around twenty works - was created in 1983/84 when Joan Mitchell's close friend Gisèle Barreau lost her cousin in 1982. She spoke of her memories of a hidden valley in Brittany, wild and flooded with light. A place of childhood, life and loss. She wished she could travel with him to that place again.

Mitchell had never been to Brittany, but she too had suffered a great loss. Her sister also died in 1982, and Mitchell later said she had wanted to paint an imaginary place, a place she would have liked to visit. In the series, green, blue, bright yellow and earthy tones flow into one another - powerful, stormy, vulnerable and full of longing. The painted meadows and bushes are metaphorically charged, touching on the remembered, the lost and the lasting.

Cracks

Joan Mitchell always worked with what was there. Even when it hurt. She did not instrumentalise the pain. She didn't suppress it either, but worked with it.

There were many goodbyes in her life. The loss of her mother in 1966, with whom she had a complicated but deeply formative relationship, and the death of her father just four years earlier. The break-up with Jean-Paul, with whom she had been linked for more than two decades. And finally, the death of her sister from cancer, which shook her to the core. Mitchell rarely spoke publicly about her grief. But her paintings became denser and more emotionally charged during these years. With dense, cracked brushwork, in demanding colours, in forms that sought support.

Her alcohol consumption was well known. Friends, gallery owners and colleagues talked about it, and it was part of her public demeanour: loud, direct, sarcastic - often with a glass in her hand. Quite the drinking, ranting, excessive artist. Her assistant and later biographer Patricia Albers describes her alcohol consumption as part of Mitchell's self-image as a non-conformist, resistant woman.
But even after a night of drinking, Joan Mitchell worked with discipline in her studio the next morning.

She was diagnosed with cancer in the mid-1980s. Mitchell underwent operations, later radiotherapy, and in the meantime lost her physical strength. But she did not stop painting. Her paintings remained powerful - but now often interspersed with white spaces. They showed her unbroken desire for expanse and movement.

Joan Mitchell died in Paris in 1992. Her last works seem to have the opposite of farewell in mind: Presence. Life. Colour.

Legacy

In public, she was long regarded as 'the one who drank with the boys', a talented outsider among the heroic male painters. It took a while for her own voice to be heard. In the 1980s, the field of feminist art history gained momentum and began to re-evaluate women artists who had previously been overlooked or marginalised. In this context, Mitchell's work was considered to exist beyond purely stylistic categorisation, representing an independent artistic position.

After her death, major retrospectives such as the one in 2002: Joan Mitchell: The Paintings at the Whitney Museum, and Joan Mitchell at the San Francisco MoMA (later also shown in Baltimore and Paris), played a significant role in repositioning her influence. She is no longer considered a marginal figure, but rather a central artistic counterpart to her male colleagues. The art market has long since followed suit. Her works now fetch millions.

In 1993, one year after her death, the Joan Mitchell Foundation was established. Shortly before her death in Paris, she stipulated in her will that she wanted not only to preserve her work, but also to support living artists, especially those in difficult circumstances.

The Foundation is dedicated to creating a comprehensive catalogue raisonné, as well as archiving Mitchell's letters, sketchbooks, and correspondence. It is committed to diversity, visibility, and fair promotion. The Foundation awards grants and emergency aid, particularly for painting and sculpture.

Although Mitchell herself was never 'pedagogically' active, she believed in artistic freedom and expression, as well as the value of time and space in which to work. Through the Joan Mitchell Center in New Orleans, the Foundation offers residency programmes that provide a place for artistic exchange, rest and production.

Joan Mitchell's influence is more atmospheric than stylistic. Her attitude, painterly independence and handling of emotion and colour were inspiring. Many contemporary artists regard Mitchell as a trailblazer.

Untamed

Broken lines and resistant surfaces. Even in pictures on the internet, the emotional tension and pull of Mitchell's works can be felt. However, this pales in comparison to the almost physical experience of standing in front of one of her monumental pieces. Their enormous size and vibrant colours can literally overwhelm you.

Unfortunately, this is a rare opportunity in Europe. If you are not fortunate enough to visit a retrospective — which is not even possible this year, the centenary of her birth — you must travel to Venice (Peggy Guggenheim Collection), Paris (Foundation Louis Vuitton or, after its planned reopening in 2030, the Centre Pompidou) or, more recently, London (Tate Modern).

Perhaps it's because she was a woman. Or perhaps it's because she was American. But Europe needs these huge colour spaces too.

Have you ever seen one of Joan Mitchell's paintings in person? Which one and where?

Painted in 1632, the artwork reflects the Dutch Golden Age—a period of scientific progress, economic prosperity, and artistic flourishing. At the time, Rembrandt was in his early twenties and had just arrived in Amsterdam from his hometown of Leiden. The commission from the Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons was an opportunity for him—already a familiar name in the Dutch provinces—to establish himself in the artistic heart of his country. 

An Age of Discovery

In Amsterdam, the economy was thriving, trade was booming, and science was making remarkable strides. The emerging middle class was eager for knowledge, and new discoveries in medicine and the natural sciences sparked widespread interest.

Anatomy played a special role in this context. The human body was no longer seen solely as a divine mystery but as an object of study to be understood. Anatomy lessons became major social events—not just for medical professionals but also for affluent citizens—blending education, prestige, and a touch of entertainment.

One such event was the annual public dissection organized by the Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons. This influential institution not only oversaw the training of new surgeons but also actively contributed to the advancement of medical knowledge. The group portrait they commissioned from Rembrandt was intended to serve both as documentation and as a representation of the guild as a modern, progressive institution.

Commissions for group portraits from guilds and other prestigious associations were common at the time. However, before Rembrandt’s arrival, these portraits were often static and uninspired—figures arranged in symmetrical rows, facing the viewer with stiff expressions; more an exercise in duty than artistic expression. Each person was meant to be equally visible, especially in guild or regent portraits, where all participants contributed financially to the artwork.

But Rembrandt broke with this tradition. He didn’t place the individuals at the centre; instead, he focused on the scene itself—the lesson, the gesture, the pursuit of knowledge.
His painting doesn’t just represent; it tells a story.

It catapulted him into the spotlight—securing the attention of art patrons of his time.

What Makes This Painting So Remarkable?

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp is a complex interplay of composition, lighting, subtle details, and profound symbolism.

Even through the arrangement of the figures, Rembrandt creates a dynamic scene. It not only achieves a sense of harmonious balance but also reinforces the impression of a collective pursuit of knowledge—a symbolic representation of shared curiosity and intellectual endeavour. Interestingly, none of the men are looking at the corpse. Their gazes are directed towards Dr Tulp, his gesture, or the book. Some even appear distant or lost in thought, adding a layer of individuality to the scene.

This creates a gap in the visual dynamic—one that we, the viewers, are meant to fill. We are the ones who look directly at the dead body, effectively placing us in the role of a participant in the dissection.

It could also be interpreted as a subtle reminder that the true focus of observation isn’t death, but life itself.

Anatomy of the Scene

Rembrandt depicts the exposed tendons of the right arm with remarkable detail. He presents them in a way that is both aesthetically striking and didactically effective, though they don’t precisely reflect the actual anatomy of a real hand. In reality, the tendons lie deeper, with more complex connections to the muscles.

Hands often carry deeper meaning in art. Dr Tulp’s living hand stands in stark contrast to the lifeless hand of the corpse—a juxtaposition of activity and passivity, of knowledge and mortality. The living body controls, explains, and learns, while the dead body serves as a silent witness to progress.

Although Rembrandt wasn’t a physician, he likely had access to medical texts and may have observed anatomical dissections himself. De humani corporis fabrica (1543) by Andreas Vesalius was a standard anatomical reference at the time, and Rembrandt may have drawn inspiration from it. The open book at the bottom right of the painting could even be De humani corporis fabrica. However, Rembrandt deliberately chose not to create a strict scientific illustration but rather a dramatic narrative.

Hidden Symbolism

The Anatomy Lesson—known under various titles—is more than just a documentary depiction of a medical lecture. Beneath the surface of anatomical precision and scientific demonstration lies another symbolic layer: a visual reflection on life and death, transience, and the power of knowledge.

The Duality of Life and Death

Rembrandt doesn’t present death as an end but as part of a cycle where life, knowledge, and mortality are deeply intertwined. The living figures owe their knowledge to the dead body. Here, death is not shown solely as a loss but also as a source of insight.

Without the corpse, there would be no lecture, no demonstration, no new knowledge. Paradoxically, death becomes the very trigger for the vitality of the scene. The corpse isn’t anonymous. Aris Kindt was sentenced to death by hanging that very morning for armed robbery and executed on the same day. Through the depiction of his lifeless body, the painting doesn’t just remind us of death as a biological fact but also reflects on moral concepts of guilt, punishment, and justice.

Rembrandt places death among the living—not at the margins, not hidden, but at the very centre. This forces the viewer to confront it directly. Perhaps this is the painting’s most powerful symbolism: death isn’t the opposite of life—it’s part of it.

The theme of mortality runs throughout Rembrandt’s work. In his later self-portraits, he faces ageing and his own mortality with unflinching honesty. The wrinkles, the contemplative gaze, the play of light and shadow on his skin—all of it reveals that Rembrandt reflected on death not just as an artistic motif but as a personal reality.

Knowledge as Power

Dr Tulp dominates the painting not only through his position but also through his gesture. His hand is raised, while the other reveals the inner workings of the corpse’s arm—a symbol of control.

He is a doctor, a teacher, a man of status and influence. Yet his gesture can also be seen as a reference to the rising power of science in the 17th century. In an era where rational thought and empirical research were gaining authority, knowledge itself became an instrument of control over life and death.

Light and Darkness as Metaphors

In art history, light is not just a tool for depicting forms; it often carries symbolic meaning. In Rembrandt’s painting, light doesn’t merely illuminate the scene—it becomes a narrator in its own right.

The brightest light falls on the two central figures: Dr Tulp and the corpse. It shines diagonally from the upper left, highlighting Dr Tulp’s face, his instructive hand, and the corpse’s exposed arm. This focused "spotlight" gives the doctor an almost elevated presence—as if he’s not just the teacher but a kind of "figure of enlightenment."

The corpse’s body is pale, almost luminous. It forms the visual core of the painting. Its bright flesh contrasts sharply with the dark background and the sombre clothing of the onlookers, underlining the symbolic tension between life and death.

The background remains shrouded in darkness. The faces of the spectators are partially hidden in shadow, lending them a certain anonymity. This could symbolize the contrast between enlightened knowledge and the darker realms of the unknown—that which remains hidden despite all scientific advancement. Ultimately, death itself remains the greatest mystery, one that even the light of science cannot fully illuminate.

Chiaroscuro: The Play of Light and Shadow

This striking contrast is achieved through the technique of chiaroscuro. The term chiaroscuro comes from Italian and literally means “light-dark.” It refers to a method where strong contrasts between light and shadow are used to create a sense of three-dimensionality, drama, and depth.

Chiaroscuro was developed during the Italian Renaissance. Artists like Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael experimented with light to create volume and form. However, it was Caravaggio in the late 16th century who truly revolutionized this technique. He used light not just to model shapes but as a storytelling device. His figures emerge from the darkness as if illuminated by a spotlight—dramatic, direct, and emotionally charged.

Caravaggio’s style was so influential that it shaped an entire generation of artists known as the Caravaggisti. His approach to lighting found fertile ground in the Netherlands as well. Here, the dramatic light intensified the focus on the human figure—on emotions, gestures, and the body itself. While Caravaggio’s sharp contrasts often highlighted the religious dimensions of his narratives, in the Dutch context, the emphasis shifted. It was no longer heaven or the divine at the centre, but humanity in its physical and emotional reality.

Rembrandt’s Chiaroscuro: A Signature Style of His Own

While Caravaggio uses light almost like a dramatic protagonist, in Rembrandt’s work it becomes a more subtle narrator. Instead of Caravaggio’s sharp contrasts, Rembrandt preferred softer transitions. His light is often less theatrical, more intimate, and feels natural—almost like diffused daylight gently caressing faces and fabrics.

A Comparison

More Than a Portrait

The realistic, dramatic style in Rembrandt’s works aligned perfectly with the art shaped by Protestant ideals in the Netherlands. With his masterpiece, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp, he transformed the way collective portraits were composed.

It revealed that Rembrandt van Rijn was capable of far more than simply capturing faces. He created stories with colour and light, wrapped in a sense of drama that would become his signature.

For the visionary Leonardo, art and science were inseparably intertwined. Michelangelo, driven by relentless passion, created masterpieces that pushed the boundaries of what was possible. And Raphael captured the beauty of the world with an effortless sense of harmony.
What united them, what set them apart – and why does their art still move us centuries later?

Harmony: Raphael and the Quest for Balance

In the Renaissance, harmony was more than just an aesthetic ideal – it was a philosophical concept. The rediscovery of antiquity revived the belief that beauty was a reflection of a higher order, a symbol of the divine and humanity’s pursuit of perfection.

Artists like Raphael embraced the ideas of proportion, symmetry, and balance found in ancient writings, such as those of Vitruvius and Plato. Through clear compositions, a subtle colour palette, and the emotional depth of his figures, Raphael’s works evoke a sense of unity, where everything is interconnected – the earthly and the divine, the past and the present.

Raphael’s Madonnas

Raphael’s Madonna paintings stand out for their sense of movement and humanity, distinguishing them from earlier depictions of the Virgin Mary. Unlike the often rigid and symbolic Madonnas of the Gothic period, Raphael’s figures appear alive and emotionally tangible. The fusion of human warmth with traditional iconography was groundbreaking in the Renaissance – a tender gaze, a gentle smile, or the suggestion of movement, combined with the soft transitions of skin tones (the incarnato) and subtle gradations of light, lends his figures a lifelike presence without descending into excessive drama.

The Sistine Madonna is a prime example: Mary appears not just as a saint but as a mother. Her posture is calm and serene, yet the slight sway of her body, her gaze extending beyond the viewer, and the Christ Child nestled in her arms bring movement and depth to the scene. Raphael achieves this through masterful composition: the diagonal line between Mary and the child creates dynamism, while the placement of the surrounding figures provides stability. Warm, soft tones dominate, enriched by light that adds dimension and depth. This blend of symmetry and vitality transforms the Madonna into a symbol of harmony, uniting the divine and the human in perfect balance.

The School of Athens

With The School of Athens, Raphael created one of the most significant frescoes of the Renaissance. Located in the Stanze of the Vatican, the work depicts an imagined gathering of the greatest philosophers and scientists of antiquity – a celebration of the human spirit and intellectual diversity. It unites movement, order, and intellect in perfect harmony.

At the centre of the composition stand Plato and Aristotle, their gestures symbolizing the two principal currents of thought: Plato points to the heavens, a reference to his metaphysical ideas, while Aristotle gestures toward the earth, emphasizing his focus on the empirical world. Their presence forms the heart of the fresco, around which the other philosophers and scholars are grouped – a symbol of how differing approaches and ideas can come together to form a harmonious whole.

The architecture in the background is more than just a backdrop; it plays a vital role in the composition. The vanishing lines of the classical arches guide the viewer’s eye toward the central figures, while the symmetrical arrangement of the groups creates a sense of structure that never feels rigid. Whether in groups or alone, the figures are depicted in lively discussion, deep thought, or expressive gestures, keeping the composition dynamic and full of life.

Raphael masterfully embodies the principle of “unity in diversity”, a core idea of Renaissance humanism. Each group appears self-contained, yet remains an integral part of the larger entire. Every philosopher is characterized with individual traits: Diogenes reclines casually on the steps, Heraclitus appears lost in thought, and Pythagoras immerses himself in mathematical studies.

Raphael's Legacy

Raphael's workshop in Rome was a hub of Renaissance art, exceptionally well-organised and one of the largest of its time. He led a team of highly skilled assistants and pupils who worked under his guidance. Raphael's gift for creating harmony extended beyond his artwork and into the structure of his workshop, enabling him to complete an impressive volume of commissions, including frescoes, paintings, and architectural projects.

The fact that Raphael trained pupils is not merely a footnote in his career but a central part of his legacy. He not only produced his own masterpieces but laid the groundwork for artistic continuity that extended far beyond his lifetime. His workshop became a model of artistic excellence and effective knowledge transfer, setting him apart from many of his contemporaries. Raphael's influence resonated through generations, inspiring artists such as Titian and Rubens, who admired his clarity of vision and mastery of composition.

Power: Michelangelo and the Intensity of Expression

Michelangelo's works depict humanity as creative, struggling, suffering, and triumphant. They radiate power, not as a mere physical attribute, but as a pursuit of greatness, emotional depth, the breaking of boundaries, and the creation of something that transcends human existence.

Monumental Works: Power Carved in Stone

Michelangelo was only 20 years old when he completed his famous Pietà. The sculpture depicts the Virgin Mary holding the lifeless body of Christ in her arms, immediately after the crucifixion. It is one of Michelangelo's earliest masterpieces and the only work he ever signed with his name.

Mary radiates both sorrow and quiet acceptance. She cradles her son’s body, yet her expression shows no distorted grief. Here, Michelangelo’s ability to convey power lies not in dramatic gestures or excessive emotion but in the subtle tension of Mary’s posture.

One hand supports Christ with maternal tenderness, while the other opens outward, as if acknowledging the divine significance of the moment. Michelangelo presents Mary not only as a grieving mother but as a mediator between God and humanity. This delicate balance between strength and serenity is what makes the Pietà so profoundly moving.

Despite Mary’s monumental size, which was necessary to support the lifeless body of Christ, the sculpture does not appear unnatural. Michelangelo achieves this through the masterful draping of her garments, which harmoniously integrate her volume into the overall composition.

Christ lies in a position that conveys both his weight and his brokenness. His muscles are relaxed, his head falls back – Michelangelo portrays the inevitability of death with heart-wrenching realism. Yet, at the same time, Christ’s body does not seem weakened but retains a sense of strength. The perfectly rendered anatomy, the tension in his limbs, and the details such as the crown of thorns and the wounds create a paradoxical blend of fragility and power.

Where the Pietà demonstrates the power of emotional expression, David stands as a testament to physical strength and mental discipline. Michelangelo depicts David in the moment just before his triumph over Goliath – fully focused, muscles taut, and ready to act. The details, from the veins on his hands to the tension in his tendons, are so lifelike that one might almost expect him to move at any moment.

David is not merely a portrayal of a biblical hero but a symbolic figure of the Renaissance. He embodies the triumph of intellect over brute force and reflects the ideal of the “Homo universalis” – the individual who achieves greatness through reason and discipline.

For Michelangelo, sculpting was not an act of creation from nothing but one of discovery. To him, the artist was a tool, revealing God’s creation – a spiritual calling. This concept is beautifully reflected in one of his most famous quotes:

"I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free."

Whether Michelangelo truly uttered this phrase remains historically uncertain, as it was only recorded later. Yet it perfectly encapsulates his approach to art and his revolutionary relationship with stone. Michelangelo often selected marble blocks that other artists deemed unusable, skilfully incorporating their natural forms and imperfections into his figures.

David is a prime example: the 5.17-metre marble block had been rejected over 40 years earlier by two other sculptors, who considered it too narrow and flawed. Michelangelo, however, accepted the challenge and transformed it into one of the greatest masterpieces in the history of art.

The Sistine Chapel: Power and Spirituality in Colour

The ceiling frescoes of the Sistine Chapel were a tour de force in every sense – physically, emotionally, and artistically. Michelangelo, who considered himself more of a sculptor than a painter, spent four years working on this monumental project. He created not merely a series of impressive images but an entire world filled with drama, spirituality, and movement.

The most famous section, The Creation of Adam, depicts the powerful gesture of God reaching out with an extended finger to bring life to Adam’s lifeless body – a striking representation of divine energy transferring to humanity. Yet Michelangelo’s mastery extends beyond this iconic scene. The frescoes capture the struggle between good and evil, the dynamism of creation, and the tensions inherent in the human condition. 

Michelangelo the Perfectionist: A Man at War with Himself

Michelangelo's relentless pursuit of perfection was both a blessing and a curse. His art reflects this inner struggle – he wrestled not only with the material but also with himself. Known for his intensity and refusal to compromise, Michelangelo often worked alone, for hours on end, becoming completely absorbed in his projects.

This unwavering dedication earned him admiration but also led to conflict – especially with his patrons. Michelangelo had a notoriously fraught relationship with Pope Julius II, for whom he created the unfinished tomb, and with Pope Clement VII, who commissioned him to paint the Sistine Chapel. Both demanded much of him, and Michelangelo often resisted their expectations when they clashed with his artistic vision.

His relationships with other artists were no less complex, particularly with Raphael. Michelangelo had little regard for Raphael’s works, which he saw as too pleasing, too polished. For Michelangelo, art was born of inner struggle and passionate creation – something that required time, effort, and suffering. By contrast, Raphael’s art seemed effortless, almost playful. Beyond aesthetic differences, Michelangelo also viewed Raphael as a threat to his own position as the pre-eminent artist of the Renaissance.

Vision: Leonardo da Vinci and the World of Ideas

The Renaissance was driven by a collective pursuit of greatness – a desire for a new and better world. People sought to push beyond the known, to discover new horizons in art, science, and philosophy. Leonardo da Vinci embodied this ambition. His works shattered the boundaries of his time.

Science and Art: Making Thought Visible

Leonardo believed that understanding the world and creating art were inseparably linked. His relentless curiosity drove him to design machines, analyse the movement of water and air, and study human anatomy.

These anatomical studies, which involved dissecting cadavers, enabled Leonardo to depict the human body with an unprecedented level of precision for his time. Muscles, tendons, and movements in his paintings appear so natural that they seem almost alive.

In his famous drawing The Vitruvian Man, Leonardo combines the principles of geometry and mathematical laws with the human body. He shows how everything is harmoniously interconnected. This understanding of proportion and movement permeates all his works.

The Mona Lisa: The Mystery in Her Smile

The Mona Lisa, painted between 1503 and 1506, is regarded as one of the most famous paintings in the world. Her enigmatic smile has captivated generations of viewers.

With the Mona Lisa, Leonardo set new standards for portraiture. In the 15th century, portraits were often stiff and formal, with sitters depicted in frontal or profile views. Leonardo, however, introduced a new dynamism and vitality to the portrayal: the Mona Lisa is turned slightly to the side, seated in a relaxed yet upright posture. This pose feels far more natural and establishes a connection between the figure and the viewer.

Instead of a rigid expression, her posture conveys calm and softness, which was highly unusual at the time. Her right arm rests gently on the armrest, while her hands are elegantly crossed. This twist in her pose and the positioning of her hands later became a standard in portrait painting, as artists adopted it to give their figures greater naturalism.

The Mona Lisa’s smile is undoubtedly the painting’s most famous feature – and it was groundbreaking in itself. Previously, faces in portraits were typically static and devoid of emotion. Leonardo, however, gave the Mona Lisa a subtle, ambiguous expression. His use of sfumato renders the smile elusive, as it appears to shift depending on the viewer’s angle: at times it seems warm, at others mysterious or even melancholic.

Until the Renaissance, figures in portraits were often reduced to their societal roles or symbolic functions. The Mona Lisa’s face, however, is realistic and unique, giving her a personal and human quality. Her eyes seem to look directly at the viewer, which was highly unusual at the time. This subtle “dialogue” between the figure and the viewer brings the portrait to life, creating an intimate connection.

The landscape in the background of the Mona Lisa merges seamlessly with the figure, giving it an almost surreal quality. Mountains, rivers, and skies fade into a hazy mist. The gentle transitions between Mona Lisa’s body and the landscape create a harmonious unity, making her seem like part of nature itself. With this technique, Leonardo expanded the picture space, creating a sense of depth that still draws viewers into the painting to this day.

The Last Supper: The Drama of Humanity

The Last Supper, created between 1495 and 1498 for the refectory of the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, is a masterpiece of dramatic composition. It captures the pivotal moment when Jesus tells his disciples, “One of you will betray me.” In this work, Leonardo masterfully conveys not just the external event but the inner turmoil of the figures.

Each of the twelve apostles reacts differently: shock, doubt, indignation, or anger – the emotions are so vividly depicted that the viewer feels as though they are witnessing the scene unfold. Unlike earlier depictions, where Judas was often isolated or placed prominently in the foreground, Leonardo integrates him into the group, intensifying the betrayal.

Judas holds a small purse in his right hand, an allusion to the thirty pieces of silver, and reaches for a piece of bread with the other. He is also the only disciple whose posture leans away from the central flow of the group. This subtle yet deliberate separation marks him as the betrayer – a revelation that needs no words.

Leonardo enhances the emotional impact of The Last Supper through his precise use of perspective. All the lines of the room converge toward the central point of the fresco – Jesus. He sits calmly at the centre, a striking contrast to the dynamic movement and gestures surrounding him. This composition not only guides the viewer's eye but also symbolizes Christ as the still, unwavering centre amidst the chaos.

Technically, The Last Supper was also an experiment. Instead of painting on wet plaster, as was standard for frescoes, Leonardo chose to work on dry plaster. This allowed him to refine details and create smooth transitions of light and shadow. However, the technique proved fragile, and the painting began to deteriorate quickly. Within a few decades, the first signs of damage were already visible. Despite numerous restorations and preservation efforts, the fresco remains heavily damaged to this day.

Leonardo the Visionary: The Art of the Unfinished

Many of Leonardo’s projects remained unfinished, yet this too is part of his legacy. His countless sketchbooks offer us a window into his extraordinary mind. His drawings of flying machines were inspired by the study of birds. He designed wings adapted to human arms, captivated by the possibility of conquering the skies. Centuries later, these concepts would inspire pioneers of aviation.

Leonardo also designed intricate machines, including catapults, armoured vehicles, and multi-barrelled guns – inventions that were far ahead of their time. He sketched plans for more hygienic cities, envisioning the separation of living and working spaces alongside sophisticated water systems to help curb disease.

His anatomical studies of humans and animals were among the most precise of his era. These detailed drawings of the human body were groundbreaking, influencing not only contemporary artists like Michelangelo but also scientists of the Enlightenment centuries later.

Through his sketches, Leonardo da Vinci created a vision of the future. His unfinished works bear witness to his relentless curiosity and drive. Never content with what he had already achieved, his vision propelled him forward – always in search of the next great idea.

Common Threads and Connections: Three Faces, One Soul

Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo Buonarroti, and Raffaello Sanzio – three artists who shaped and, in their own ways, embodied the Renaissance. Despite their differences in style and approach, their works shared a common goal: the pursuit of a perfect union between humanity and the divine, nature and spirit. Together, they represent the soul of the Renaissance – an era driven by a quest for balance, expression, and knowledge.

Each of these three masters offered their own response to the questions of their time: What is humanity? How can the divine be depicted? And how can art make the world visible?

Rivalry and Inspiration

The three artists belonged to different generations, and their lives took very different paths. Their active creative periods overlapped primarily at the beginning of the 16th century, the golden age of the High Renaissance.

Leonardo was the eldest of the three and already a celebrated figure when Michelangelo and Raphael began rising in the art scene. While Leonardo reached the height of his career in Florence and Milan during the late 15th century, Michelangelo and Raphael were still young and finding their place. The two were close in age, belonging to the same generation, and their careers intersected particularly in Rome, where they worked on significant projects in the early 16th century under Popes Julius II and Leo X.

The relationships between the three artists were marked by both mutual admiration and rivalry. This dynamic pushed them to achieve their greatest masterpieces.

• Leonardo and Michelangelo: These two giants of the Renaissance had a complicated relationship and were often seen as opposites. Leonardo was admired for his elegance, scientific precision, and calm refinement, qualities Michelangelo criticized as “too polished” and “lacking soul.” He found fault with Leonardo’s obsession with detail. Conversely, Leonardo, the thoughtful and refined intellectual, viewed Michelangelo’s raw, dramatic expressiveness with scepticism. It is said that the two publicly debated art in Florence – a rivalry that only spurred their brilliance further.

• Michelangelo and Raphael: Michelangelo regarded Raphael’s harmonious style and success at the papal court with jealousy and suspicion. To him, Raphael’s works appeared too pleasing, too “simple.” Yet, Raphael admired Michelangelo and drew inspiration from him: the powerful figures in Raphael’s Stanze frescoes (such as the prophets in The School of Athens) clearly reflect Michelangelo’s influence.

• Raphael and Leonardo: Unlike Michelangelo, Raphael looked to Leonardo’s work as a source of inspiration. He deeply admired Leonardo’s achievements and was strongly influenced by them. Leonardo’s impact is especially evident in Raphael’s depiction of faces and the spatial depth of his compositions. Raphael carefully studied Leonardo’s sfumato technique and incorporated it into his own portraits, giving them a refined, lifelike softness.

The Great Themes of Their Time: Humanism, Antiquity, and Progress

The shared legacy of these three artists lies in their liberation of art from rigid conventions. They created works that revealed the inner depth of humanity – its questions, desires, and its connection to nature and the divine. Their art was driven by the great themes of their time:

Humanism: Humanity moved to the centre – not merely as a reflection of the divine but as a creative and sentient being. Leonardo explored the human body with the precision of a scientist, Michelangelo celebrated it as an expression of strength and spirit, while Raphael presented it as a harmonious ideal.

Antiquity: All three drew inspiration from the classical world but reinterpreted it anew. Michelangelo brought the power of ancient sculpture to life, Raphael embraced its clarity and order, and Leonardo explored the proportions and natural laws that underpin it.

Progress: The Renaissance was also an age of knowledge and discovery. Each artist was a pioneer in his own right: Leonardo approached art analytically, making it a method for understanding the world. Michelangelo pushed the boundaries of material and form, while Raphael perfected the use of perspective, creating compositions of extraordinary balance that shaped generations of artists. Through his workshop, Raphael also set new standards for the teaching and transmission of artistic knowledge.

Together, they not only reflected the ideals of their time but also shaped the course of art history. They defined what art could be: a dialogue between humanity and the world, between past and future.

What Fascinates you about these Giants of Art?

I could write endlessly about Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael – and still feel as though there’s more to say. Their works are so significant and layered with meaning.
But now I’m curious about your thoughts: What fascinates you about these three artists? Do you have a favourite work, or perhaps a special memory tied to one of their masterpieces?
I’d love to hear your perspective in the comments!

But Liebermann was much more than a virtuoso of light. He was a key figure in the modernization of the German art scene. As president of the Berlin Secession, he paved the way for many young artists and helped establish modern art in Germany.

Early Years and Education

Max Liebermann was born in 1847 to a wealthy Jewish family in Berlin. His interest in art showed itself early on, but his family, well-respected in Berlin society, didn’t see a future for him as an artist. It was common for sons of wealthy families to pursue careers that promised social security and prestige. They encouraged him to become a lawyer or enter the business world, following in his father’s footsteps as a successful businessman.

However, Liebermann was not enthusiastic about this idea. His heart was set on art, and he increasingly felt confined by his family’s expectations. Against their initial resistance, he eventually chose art as his path in life. Around 1866, he began private lessons with Carl Steffeck in Berlin. Two years later, he started studying at the Grand Ducal Saxon Art School in Weimar, known for its focus on realistic painting.

In Weimar, he created his early masterpiece The Goose Pluckers, inspired by a drawing by his fellow student Thomas Herbst and the works of Mihály von Munkácsy. At just 25 years old, he exhibited his debut work publicly in Hamburg, but it was rejected by conservative critics for its "poor" subject matter and dark palette.

Nevertheless, the painting found a buyer in the railway tycoon Strousberg. The proceeds allowed Liebermann to move to Paris, where he lived between 1873 and 1878, engaging deeply with the French art scene. The works of Jean-François Millet and Gustave Courbet, leading figures of Realism, greatly influenced his style.

During his Paris years, Liebermann spent the summer months regularly in the Netherlands, which also had a profound impact on his work. He gradually broke away from academic traditions and began developing his own artistic language.

The Development of His Style

Liebermann was fascinated by artists in France and the Netherlands who depicted rural life in a natural, unembellished way. He adopted their socially critical perspective on the hard lives of rural workers and reflected it in his own works. His scenes were neither heroic nor idealized but showed both the hardship and dignity of simple labour. This contrasted with the idealized representations common in the art of the time.

In addition to depicting everyday life, Liebermann became more focused on light and colour. The French Impressionists, especially Claude Monet, greatly influenced him. He was struck by their ability to portray light in a fleeting, atmospheric manner. Liebermann adopted this approach, filtering light through trees and leaves, allowing it to flow over meadows and paths. This looser, flowing style became especially evident in his later garden paintings.

Return to Berlin

Between 1879 and 1884, Max Liebermann lived mainly in Munich, where he continued to develop his artistic style and solidified his reputation as a leading figure of Realism. In Munich, he connected with important artist circles, forming relationships that would later shape his career in Berlin.

Returning to Berlin in 1884, Liebermann took on a significant role in the German art scene. Having embraced progressive ideas of Realism and Impressionism in Paris, he faced resistance in Germany, often clashing with the conservative establishment. Institutions like the Academy of Arts rejected many of the modern movements Liebermann supported, seeing them as a threat to established values.

In 1892, Liebermann co-founded the Vereinigung der XI with ten other progressive artists. Their aim was to create a platform for modern art outside the confines of traditional academies. They organized independent exhibitions to showcase the works of artists who did not conform to academic norms.

In 1898, Liebermann became a co-founder and first president of the Berlin Secession, which stood in opposition to the conventional art understanding of the Prussian Academy of Arts and the Verein Berliner Künstler. The Secession played a key role in promoting modern art and supporting young artists.

During his time in Berlin, Liebermann’s artistic style evolved significantly. His palette brightened, and his works became more infused with vibrant colours and a looser, more impressionistic technique. He focused more on scenes of bourgeois life and gained recognition as a sought-after portrait artist. After building his summer house by Lake Wannsee, he turned his attention to landscape and garden paintings, characterized by a masterful use of light and atmosphere. Liebermann found both a retreat and a source of inspiration in his garden.

Liebermann and the Political Situation

"I could not possibly eat as much as I would like to vomit."

- Max Liebermann

As a prominent Jewish artist, Max Liebermann was increasingly confronted with the antisemitic policies of the Nazi regime in the 1930s. The Nazis branded his art as "degenerate" and removed his works from public collections. In 1933, he was forced to resign from his honorary presidency of the Prussian Academy of Arts due to his Jewish heritage. This marked the end of his public career, and he gradually withdrew from public life.

Liebermann witnessed the growing isolation and disenfranchisement of the Jewish population in Germany firsthand. His later years were marked by bitterness and disappointment. On the day of Hitler’s rise to power, a torchlit procession passed by his home on Pariser Platz. This was when Liebermann made his famous statement, quoted above.

During this period, his artistic output declined, as the political and social circumstances increasingly paralysed him. He died in 1935, before the persecution of Jews in Germany reached its horrific peak, but his final years were marked by a deep sense of powerlessness and grief over the destruction of what he had built in both his life and art.

Liebermann’s wife, Martha, later endured the full impact of antisemitic persecution. In 1943, facing deportation to the Theresienstadt concentration camp, she took her own life. The graves of Max and Martha Liebermann lie in the Jewish Cemetery in Berlin’s Prenzlauer Berg.

Max Liebermann Image Gallery

Legacy and Influence on the Art World

Max Liebermann’s works are today recognized as significant contributions to German Impressionism and Realism. After years of ostracism during the Nazi regime, his work was rediscovered in the post-war years. Liebermann influenced generations of artists, particularly through his innovative use of light and colour and his engagement with social themes. His work is regularly honoured in museums such as the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin and in exhibitions worldwide. His garden paintings from Wannsee are among his most famous creations.

For me, Max Liebermann is not only a master of light but also an artist who captures the beauty of everyday life with honesty and sensitivity that resonates deeply with me as an artist.
What fascinates you most about Max Liebermann’s art? Is there a particular work that touches you? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments – I look forward to your ideas and impressions!

Berthe Morisot was a true pioneer in an era when women were often sidelined in the art world. As a co-founder of Impressionism, she created works that, with their delicate brushstrokes and subtle colour nuances, convey a sense of intimacy and warmth. Though her name is far less known than her male counterparts, like Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, or Auguste Renoir, Berthe Morisot carved out her place in the art world.

Who was this woman who managed to make a name for herself in a time when art was firmly in male hands?

“I don’t believe there has ever been a man who treated a woman as an equal, and that is all I would have asked for, for I know I am just as good as they are.”

- Berthe Morisot

Berthe Morisot: Between Talent and Gender Roles

It certainly wasn’t easy. Although Berthe Morisot was one of the most significant Impressionists, her work (during her lifetime and especially in the decades after her death) was overshadowed by her status as the "muse" and sister-in-law of Édouard Manet. People even often claimed she was his student. But she was not! Long before they met, she was an established artist in her own right. This reduction of her role to her relationship with a male colleague was typical of how women artists were marginalized.

As a woman, Morisot was excluded from many important artistic networks—central places for exchanging ideas and making connections in the art world. Without this access, it was not only harder for her to gain a foothold but she was also significantly limited in her choice of subjects. The most coveted motifs of the late 19th century—public life in bars, cafés, and theatres—were closed off to her. Morisot had to focus on domestic and private scenes.

Despite this, she built a successful career. But she constantly had to fight against gender-based prejudices. Contemporary critics and audiences tended to view her work through a gendered lens. Even well-meaning critics like Émile Zola praised her style, but the vocabulary they used often reduced her to female stereotypes, describing her art as “delicate,” “charming,” “graceful,” or “feminine”—attributes that subtly undermined her work by framing it as inherently “female.”

In 1880, the critic Charles Ephrussi described her style as follows: “It seems as if she crushes flower petals on her palette and then spreads them onto the canvas in highly spiritual brushstrokes. The result seems haphazard, yet they come together, and something very fine emerges, which is lively and charming, and one senses it rather than truly sees it.”
What bothers me here isn’t the soft, floral description of a woman’s work, but the exclusivity of it.

However, not all reviews were as generous. Albert Wolff, a conservative art critic of the late 19th century, wrote a piece in Le Figaro about the 5th Impressionist exhibition in 1880. He cautiously praised some of the male Impressionists as bold and innovative. But he - brace yourself - derided Morisot’s painting style as unfinished and whimsical, attributing this to her femininity.

"Why does she, with her talent, not take the trouble to finish her paintings? Morisot is a woman, and therefore capricious. Like Eve, she bites into the apple, but gives up far too quickly. A pity, because she bites very well."

Had Eve finished the fruit from the tree of knowledge, there would have been none left for Adam—and all men thereafter. Though I doubt it would have made a difference for Albert Wolff.

What was considered powerful and progressive in men was dismissed as incomplete and fickle in women.

A Leading Impressionist

Berthe Morisot grew up in a wealthy, educated family in Bourges, France. Cultural and artistic interests were encouraged by the family. Urged by her mother, Berthe studied painting alongside her sister, Edma, under several artists from the Barbizon School. Since women at the time were not allowed to attend state-run art academies, they received private lessons.

Edma and Berthe often visited the Louvre, where they made copies of masterpieces and studied various painting techniques. During these visits, they also met other young painters, including Claude Monet and Edgar Degas.

The bond between Berthe and her sister Edma was very close. The two shared a passion for art, often painting together and supporting each other. Edma was also a talented artist. In 1864, both sisters exhibited at the Paris Salon for the first time.

Paris Salon

The Salon de Paris was the most important official art exhibition in France and the main venue for artists to gain recognition. Organized by the Académie des Beaux-Arts, the Salon attracted both established and emerging talent. Exhibiting at the Salon usually meant professional success and social acceptance. The conservative jury, however, favoured traditional, academic art styles.

At only 23, Berthe Morisot was able to present two of her works, Snowy Landscape and The Family Home in Passy, at the 1864 Salon—an impressive achievement. This opened doors to a wider audience and earned her recognition within established art circles.

In 1869, Edma married and chose to give up painting to devote herself to family life. For Berthe, this marked the loss of a close artistic companion. Adhering to the social conventions of the time, Morisot, now without a chaperone, could no longer visit the Louvre or go on painting excursions. She retreated into her art and distanced herself from academic painting. Over time, a new artistic network developed, in which Édouard Manet, whom she had met a year earlier, played a particularly important role.

It was probably the break with traditional academic painting in favour of a freer, more experimental approach that prompted Morisot to destroy her earlier works. For us today, this is an incredible loss: hardly a single painting from the period before 1869 has survived.

Turning to Impressionism

Berthe had to start over. One of the major influences on the new direction of Morisot’s work was Camille Corot, whom she had also met at the Louvre. He encouraged her to paint outdoors, igniting her passion for plein-air painting - a central element of her later Impressionist works. The encounter with Édouard Manet was also a turning point in Morisot’s artistic development. Although Manet wasn’t strictly an Impressionist himself, he introduced her to the circles of the emerging Impressionist movement.

Manet was fascinated by Morisot and painted her several times, as in works like Berthe Morisot with a Bouquet of Violets (1872) and Le Repose (1870). Their friendship was marked by deep mutual respect. Manet was impressed by Morisot’s talent and independent artistic vision. Even the lighter tones in his later works are attributed to Berthe’s influence.

She, in turn, saw him as an extraordinarily talented artist, admiring his technique and innovative use of colour and light. 

However, Manet occasionally tried to position himself as Morisot’s mentor, a role she did not need, as her letters to her sister Edma reveal. Though Manet inspired her with his avant-garde approach that challenged traditional boundaries, Berthe was much bolder and more decisive in her use of light and colour. And she developed rapidly beyond his influence. Her works became less formal, increasingly embracing the Impressionist aesthetic. Loose brushstrokes, bright colour palettes, and an emphasis on fleeting moments and impressions characterized her distinct artistic language.

By the early 1870s, Morisot had fully committed to Impressionism. Though she had regularly exhibited at the Salon since 1864, she turned away from the institution, finding its rigid, conservative stance incompatible with her increasingly modern style. In 1874, at the first exhibition of the Impressionists, Berthe Morisot exhibited alongside artists like Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, and Camille Pissarro. At the second exhibition the following year, her painting L'Intérieur (see cover image) fetched the highest sale price - a remarkable success!

Morisot’s Role in the Impressionist Exhibitions

Berthe Morisot was the only woman who committed to the group of Impressionists from the very beginning. With just one exception, she contributed to all the Impressionist exhibitions. In 1879, she had more important matters to attend to, as she had just given birth to her daughter, Julie. But the following year, she resumed exhibiting with the group.

The eighth and final Impressionist exhibition took place in 1886. By this time, the group had already splintered, and some of the original members, including Monet and Renoir, no longer participated. Morisot was one of the few who remained devoted to the group and played a key role in organizing the exhibition. Thanks to her efforts, works by artists like Camille Pissarro and Paul Gauguin were showcased. Her husband, Eugène Manet, the younger brother of Édouard Manet, whom she had married in 1874, assisted her with the organizational tasks.

Later Years

Berthe Morisot continued her career as a prominent artist. After the Impressionist exhibitions ended, she participated in other major exhibitions in Paris, including the Salons and various private galleries. By this point, she enjoyed widespread recognition for her art, both in France and internationally. Her works were not only appreciated by critics but also purchased by collectors. Paul Durand-Ruel, a key art dealer and promoter of the Impressionists, played a central role in marketing her paintings.

In 1892, her husband Eugène passed away, and the loss deeply affected her; her works became more introspective and atmospheric. Three years later, on 2 March 1895, Berthe herself died at the age of 54 from pneumonia, which she contracted while caring for her sick daughter Julie.

In the years following her death, Berthe Morisot’s work was appreciated by some collectors and art connoisseurs, but it gradually faded from public consciousness. As artists like Monet, Degas, Pissarro, and Renoir rose to prominence as the main figures of Impressionism, Morisot remained largely in the shadows. Over the 20th century, she almost completely disappeared from public awareness. Art historical accounts of Impressionism focused primarily on her male colleagues, and her works were rarely featured in major exhibitions, despite many of her paintings being held in prestigious collections.

Even after World War II, when Impressionism experienced a revival, Morisot’s name barely resurfaced. Art historians, in this new wave, once again concentrated on the “great masters” of Impressionism, while the women of the movement were sidelined.

Rediscovery

In the 1970s, with the rise of feminist art history, interest in female artists began to grow. Researchers increasingly questioned why so few women were given their due in art history, even though many had made significant contributions.

From the 1990s onwards, Berthe Morisot gradually regained her rightful place in the history of Impressionism. Her works were featured in major international exhibitions, and more books and scholarly studies began to give her work the recognition it deserved.

Today, her name is more frequently mentioned alongside Monet, Degas, Renoir, and Pissarro.

“Berthe Morisot was a woman who, with all her propriety and discretion, was a true revolutionary.”

- Paul Valéry

Marginalization of Women in Art

When we look at art history, it is overwhelmingly male. Artists like Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, Artemisia Gentileschi, Rosa Bonheur, and others who were successful in their time are often portrayed as “exceptions” in a male-dominated art world.

The formal and informal barriers women faced long denied them access to art academies, exhibitions, or networks. Life drawing classes were deemed inappropriate for them, and they often weren’t even allowed to move freely in public without a chaperone.

And yet, many women artists achieved recognition in their lifetimes, only to be erased from art history after their deaths. Their works were either attributed to male artists, marginalized, or simply ignored.

This systematic erasure or downgrading of women’s roles in art reflects the social norms of the time, which restricted their access to education, art institutions, and public spaces. Power structures within the art world—dominated by male curators, collectors, and critics—reinforced these barriers. Men decided what art was considered important, which often resulted in the devaluation or omission of women’s work, even when they were successful in their era.

To this day, works by female artists are less frequently represented in major exhibitions or prestigious collections. On the art market, they often fetch lower prices than those by their male counterparts.

Feminist art history has started to fill these gaps.

A Final Thought

To conclude, I want to express my thanks to my dear friend and colleague, Nadine Achtelik, who suggested Berthe Morisot as the topic for this article. Often, the best ideas come from a conversation, and this was certainly the case here.

I hope you found inspiration while reading, and I’d love to hear your thoughts, questions, or comments below.

How do you perceive Berthe Morisot’s work? What resonates with you about her story?

Fairly quickly, however, Lotte Laserstein came to mind. I first encountered her work two or three years ago. You usually only get to see her paintings in retrospectives, as most of her work is held in private collections (with a few exceptions in Berlin, Frankfurt/Main, and various Swedish museums). Lotte Laserstein's paintings captivate me with their subtly intense style. In the end, I chose her nude painting "In My Studio."

Like many women before—and some after—her, Lotte Laserstein faced significant obstacles in her path to becoming an artist. Despite this, she achieved remarkable success. The press once wrote: "Lotte Laserstein—this is a name to remember. The artist is among the very best of the younger generation of painters. Her brilliant rise will be one to watch."

That was in 1929. Just four years later, in 1933, after the Nazis came to power, Lotte Laserstein was banned from exhibiting her work due to her Jewish heritage. Her art was denounced as "degenerate," and when she was expelled from the professional association in 1935, she lost access to art supplies and was forced to close her studio.

An invitation to exhibit in Stockholm provided her with a chance to escape. She sent a large portion of her paintings ahead and followed them in December 1937. Lotte Laserstein never returned to Germany.

"In my Studio" by Lotte Laserstein

The painting "In My Studio," created in 1928 using oil on wood in the alla prima technique, depicts the artist at work. Lotte Laserstein is shown painting a nude portrait of her close friend and favourite model, Traute Rose.

In the background, through the window, you can glimpse a snowy Berlin-Wilmersdorf. The atmosphere is calm, almost a bit melancholic. As a representative of the New Objectivity movement, Lotte Laserstein employed a restrained colour palette, which further enhances the mood of the painting.

In the foreground, Traute Rose lies relaxed and confident on a bed, occupying most of the canvas, which measures a modest 46 × 73 cm. Between the foreground and the background, the artist herself is positioned, bridging the two spaces.

The Female Gaze

It’s not just the undeniable technical mastery that moves me, but the subtle emotional depth of the piece.

The nude is both sensitive and compelling. Traute's pose evokes famous nudes, such as Titian's Venus. This reference to great masterpieces is a technique that Laserstein frequently employs in her works, showcasing her deep knowledge of art history. However, unlike many male depictions of the nude, Lotte Laserstein does not turn her model into an object. Traute is not portrayed in an unguarded moment. As viewers, we are not made into voyeurs or gawkers.

The subject is fully aware of herself, and the relationship between the artist and the model feels equal. The female body is presented as something natural and unassuming—not as an object of desire. It is naked, but not exposed.

The entire painting exudes intimacy and a familiarity between the artist and her model that doesn’t need to be overtly emphasized.

What is New Objectivity?

The New Objectivity was an art movement that emerged in Germany in the 1920s. It developed as a reaction against Expressionism, which was perceived as overly emotional and subjective.

New Objectivity aimed for a precise and objective representation of reality. The artists of this movement sought to depict the world as it truly was, without idealizing or romanticizing it. Life in the Weimar Republic, with all its social issues, was portrayed directly and often unflinchingly.

Many works of New Objectivity engaged critically with the social and political conditions of their time. Themes of poverty, war, social injustice, and the corruption of the ruling class were commonly explored. One of the most renowned figures of the movement was Otto Dix, known for his incisive and often grim portrayals of life after World War I.

While Lotte Laserstein's paintings also belong to the New Objectivity, they are neither socially critical nor detached. Far from being cold or clinical, her work explores the theme of the "New Woman"—athletic and androgynous, fashionable, independent, and emancipated. In this way, Lotte Laserstein captured the spirit of her era.

The lost generation

Although Lotte Laserstein was able to resume her work in Sweden after a few years, she was never able to recapture the success she had enjoyed earlier in her career and largely disappeared from the public eye. She once remarked, "My flight to Sweden shattered my life into two parts."

This places her among the so-called "Lost Generation," a group of artists active in Germany between the two World Wars who were largely forgotten due to the political upheavals and the impact of World War II. This generation of artists experienced their creative peak in the 1920s and early 1930s, but were later marginalized, persecuted, or forced into exile following the Nazi rise to power and the subsequent repressions.

While some male artists of the Lost Generation were rediscovered in the post-war period, particularly from the 1960s and 1970s onwards, when there was renewed interest in modernism and the intersections between art and politics, many had already passed away or their works had been significantly reduced, making comprehensive rediscovery difficult.

The rediscovery of female artists occurred much later than that of their male counterparts, often only beginning in the 1980s and 1990s, driven by the women's movement and the growing interest in gender studies. This delayed recognition meant that many female artists had almost completely disappeared from art history, and the recovery of their work often remained fragmentary.

Lotte Laserstein’s rediscovery was actually due to a stroke of luck. In 1987, Agnew’s and The Belgrave Gallery in London planned an exhibition on the life’s work of Erich Wolfsfeld, Lotte Laserstein’s former teacher in Berlin. The exhibition’s curator, Caroline Stroude, wanted to speak with his former star pupil and visited her in Sweden. There, she saw Laserstein’s own works on the walls and was immediately captivated. On the spot, she promised the artist her own exhibition. Laserstein attended the opening of this exhibition in the same year, accompanied by her dear friend Traute Rose.

This event paved the way for her reemergence. In the early 2000s, the first German retrospectives of Lotte Laserstein’s work were held in Berlin. The artist, however, did not live to see this renewed recognition. Lotte Laserstein passed away in 1993 at the age of 94.

A look beneath the surface

Lotte Laserstein's "In My Studio" resonates with me on a profound emotional level because it captures not only the physical beauty of the female form but also a quiet connection and mutual trust between the artist and her model.
The intimacy and almost palpable tranquillity that the painting exudes often lead viewers to speculate about the nature of the relationship between the two women. Perhaps this is why rumours of a lesbian relationship between the artist and her model have persisted, even though there is no evidence to support these claims beyond the rumours themselves.

Is there a particular artwork by a female artist that has deeply moved you? What makes that work unique for you?

After her death, Artemisia Gentileschi was forgotten. Unlike her male colleagues, she was denied recognition for her work for a long time.
It was not until the beginning of the 20th century, when the feminist movement gained momentum, that Artemisia Gentileschi was rediscovered and given new importance. She became the figurehead of the movement. Her art and life are a testament to the strength and fighting spirit of women.

Artemisia in the context of her time

When Artemisia was born in 1593, the Renaissance was coming to an end. Art has a reciprocal relationship with history, tradition and society, as artists respond to the developments and changes of their time. In this way, new artistic epochs can emerge in artistic dialogue with politics, religion, society, social and cultural trends.

The Renaissance, which lasted until around 1600, was characterised by a return to and inspiration from the classical art and culture of antiquity and humanist ideals. Man was at the centre of his world and should use the full potential of his intellect. This led to scientific achievements - and art also placed the individual at the centre.

People broke away from the Church and from God. In 1517, Martin Luther nailed his theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, the starting point of the Reformation. It led to the division of Western Christianity into Catholic and Protestant denominations and conflicts between the different groups. These conflicts intensified around 1600, culminating in the Thirty Years' War in 1618.

Artemisia grows up in the midst of these social and cultural tensions.

Childhood and adolescence

Painting is the family trade. Her father was the distinguished Roman painter Orazio Gentileschi. He moved in the city's artistic circles and was friends with Caravaggio, one of the first great Baroque painters.

The fragmentation of Italy into competing, feuding and often warring principalities, duchies and viceroyalties created a greater desire for order, authority and stability. The Catholic Church harnessed this desire to meet the challenges of the 'true faith' in the Renaissance and embarked on a counter-reformation. It worked hard to win back the faithful. Art and architecture became instruments of propaganda.

The Baroque style was born. Mostly religious themes were opulently and dramatically staged. The paintings were intended to convey sensuality and a strong emotional effect. This supported the message of the Catholic Church, but also reflected the two opposing attitudes to life at the time: Momento mori - Remember that you are going to die - on the one hand, and Carpe diem - Seize the day, enjoy life - on the other.

Artemisia is only 12 years old when her mother dies. From then on, she grew up in her father's studio, rarely allowed to leave the house to ensure her modesty.
Orazio Gentileschi trained Artemisia and her two brothers in painting, teaching them the subtleties of art from an early age. But Artemisia in particular showed interest and talent.

Drama and realism: the colour palette of Artemisia Gentileschi

In Artemisia's time, artistic training was hardly accessible to women. They were not admitted to academies. They could not sign contracts or become members of a guild. They were not even allowed to buy paints without a man's permission. Artemisia was only able to train as a painter because her father was an artist and trained her himself.

She is not the first known woman painter. Like her, most of them came from artistic families. However, unlike her contemporaries, Artemisia did not focus on still life, portraits or landscapes. Artemisia painted large history paintings based on biblical or mythological themes. And she painted female nudes! Until then - and for a long time afterwards - all this was reserved for men.

Dramatic compositions, strong emotions, profound effects of light and shadow, and an intense emphasis on movement and dynamics are typical of the Baroque style. And Artemisia is an excellent master of it.

Rape and trial

Her father recognised his daughter's talent early on and was impressed. To refine her technique, he asked his friend and colleague Agostino Tassi to teach Artemisia in 1611. Tassi was a landscape painter and would introduce her to the art of perspective. When her father was away, he raped Artemisia, who was 17 years old.

Now she is no longer a virgin, which in the patriarchal mindset of the 17th century is considered a disgrace to her family. Tassi puts pressure on the young girl. He promises her marriage (Artemisia hopes to become "good" again) if she complies, and continues to exploit her for months.

Her father seems to know of these events. But it was only when he discovered that Tassi was already married that he denounced him. A 7-month trial ensued, the minutes of which have been preserved to this day.
The trial was not about the violence done to Artemisia, nor was it about getting justice for her. It was about satisfaction for Orazio, who now had a "damaged" daughter to marry...

And once again, Artemisia is subjected to violence. Not only does she have to face the humiliating questions of the defence lawyer, the mockery, ridicule and denials of her rapist, and relive the whole rape, she also has to undergo a gynaecological examination in court and an interrogation under torture(!).
Her fingers are wrapped in strings and pulled tighter and tighter until Artemisia cries out in pain: "È vero, è vero, è vero." - It's true, it's true, it's true. A procedure, incidentally, that could have broken her fingers and ended her career as a painter forever.

In the end, Tassi is indeed found guilty and sentenced to 5 years in exile. However, due to his good connections, he does not serve this sentence and the Pope himself prevents his exile. Tassi's career continued unabated. Even Orazio resumes his friendship with him (Tassi leaves Rome only a few years later, when he is accused of another brawl).

Artemisia, however, is dishonoured in front of everyone. Orazio immediately married her to the Florentine artist Pierantonio Stiattesi and the young couple left Rome.

The empowerment of women over male violence

Art historians are divided over whether or not Artemisia dealt with her rape in her art and settled scores with men. Some see a clear connection, others say it would be wrong to reduce her to the role of victim.

Artemisia was a serious artist and a good businesswoman. Of course, it would be far too short-sighted to assume that she wanted to 'comfort her soul' by painting and that she satisfied her thirst for revenge in the safety of her studio.

Her subjects are popular subjects of her time. Motifs that sold well and were also painted by men. But it would also be naive to assume that her experiences - as a woman and a survivor - did not inform her art.

It is how she paints, not what she paints. You can see the anguish she feels in her Susanna. Unlike some of her male colleagues who also worked on this subject, lust does not play a role in Artemisia Gentileschi's work. Artemisia first painted this subject (see image above) when she was just 16 years old, before she was raped. However, as a young girl, she may also have experienced the pressure of male attention.

Artemisia's paintings show the female perspective. Her women are not an ideal of feminine beauty, but flesh-and-blood people who act and feel.

Main work: Judith beheading Holofernes

The story of Judith and Holofernes has been depicted in art throughout the centuries. It is the story of Judith, a beautiful widow living in Bethulia, a city in ancient Israel.
Holofernes, an Assyrian general, besieges the city and threatens to destroy it. Judith decides to save her people by going to Holofernes' camp. There she gains his trust, is invited to a banquet and waits for a favourable opportunity. One night, while Holofernes sleeps drunk, Judith beheads him.

She went very close to his camp, took his hair and said, "Strengthen me today, O Lord God of Israel! Then she struck him twice on the neck with all her strength and cut off his head.

Judit 13,7 + 13,8

For the Church, Judith is the conqueror of evil, which made her a popular subject during the Counter-Reformation. However, most depictions do not show the deed itself. Either Judith is shown with her head (open or in a basket) or the discovery of the headless Holofernes. There are two famous exceptions in the history of art. One by Caravaggio, the other by Artemisia. Here is a comparison between the two:

Both paintings capture the most dramatic moment of the story and do not shy away from depicting brutality and bloody violence. Yet the effect of the two paintings is quite different.

Both works are typical of the Baroque period: dynamism and intense contrasts of light and dark, strong expression, grand gestures and dramatic staging. However, Artemisia brings her figures more into the foreground and closer together. This makes her painting even more dynamic.

Caravaggio idealises Judith's beauty. This is emphasised by the ugliness of her servant and the horror of the dying Holofernes, both of whom lie in shadow while Judith, bright and radiant, wields the sword. This emphasises the moral significance of her action - the triumph of good over evil.

Artemisia, on the other hand, paints the story from a different angle. Her Judith is not an aloof heroine, but a real woman in a real situation. And her servant is not a mere prop, but an active accomplice.

Artemisia had learned that a woman alone is no match physically for a strong man. It takes female solidarity to overcome him. Both figures appear credible and powerful in their actions, without idealised grace or beauty. You can see the physical effort in their faces. Their muscular arms - typical of Artemisia - are tensed, their expressions determined and fearless.

While Caravaggio tends to emphasise the transcendent and eternal, Artemisia's version of the story is both more gruesome but also more human.

The Artemisia style

Her paintings are realistic and naturalistic. Like her artistic idol Caravaggio, Artemisia chose ordinary people as her models. But she goes further and avoids any idealisation.

The colours in Artemisia's works are deep and intense, and she is known for her passionate depictions of human figures, especially women, opulent fabrics and delicate lace details. Also for her remarkable use of light and shadow to create drama and intensity. She mastered the technique of chiaroscuro, which emphasises the contrast between light and shadow to create depth and volume.

Artemisia's paintings have a tremendous power and expressiveness. Emotions such as love, hate, revenge, arrogance and longing are almost palpable. She was an outstanding storyteller who developed her scenarios from the deepest feelings of her characters.

Florence

In Florence, Artemisia is able to put her damaged reputation behind her. As a married woman, she enjoys respect. She set up her studio in her in-laws' house and began painting immediately. She stayed in Florence for 7 years and developed into an independent artist.

Her father wrote to the Duchess of Lorraine: Artemisia (who was only 19 at the time) had "already created works of art that perhaps great masters of the craft will never achieve".
The Duchess probably introduced her to her son, Cosimo II, head of the Medici family.

Artemisia socialised with artists and scholars, learned to read and write, and enjoyed the patronage of the Medici family. She became known as "La Pittora" - the painter.

The name that Artemisia Gentileschi made for herself at this time paved the way for a career that lasted more than 40 years. In 1616 she became the first woman to be admitted to the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, the Academy of Drawing. This was more than just an honour for her. Artemisia was now allowed to buy her own paints and art supplies (without a man's permission!). And she could sign contracts with her clients herself.

Despite all the adversities she must have faced as a woman in a male-dominated field, this made her financially independent and in control of her own life.

During her 7 years in Florence, Artemisia gave birth to 5 children and saw 3 of them die. Of her two remaining children, only her daughter Prudentia survived to adulthood. Her son Cristofano died shortly after her return to Rome.

Not much is known about her marriage. Her husband Stiattesi acted as a kind of agent for his wife. He took care of the sale of her paintings and the money transactions - but not very well.

Stiattesi took every opportunity to get into debt. This was not uncommon in artistic circles at the time, but the financial difficulties grew worse and worse. The couple probably had to leave Florence because of unpaid bills.

Return to Rome and Venice

They returned to Rome in 1620. However, the marriage broke down shortly afterwards and Pierantonio disappeared from history.
Artemisia was now a recognised artist. Among her most influential patrons were Cardinal Francesco Barberini and his secretary Cassiano Dal Pozzo. They also introduced her to artist friends. These included Nicolas Poussin, Simon Vouet and Giovanna Garzoni.

She was particularly influenced by the Frenchman Simon Vouet and his style of tenebrism - a more contrasting form of chiaroscuro. In Rome, Artemisia tended to move in the circle of French and Dutch artists.

The royal road to success as an artist in Rome in the 1620s was to paint large altarpieces and frescoes in churches. As a woman, Artemisia did not receive commissions - and her paintings were not exhibited in public.

So she used her years in Rome to reorient herself and turn to portrait painting. Here she even had a certain advantage. The gentlemen of the city had no problem with their wives and daughters posing for hours in an intimate atmosphere.

She also received a number of private commissions for historical paintings. Her fame spread throughout Italy and beyond.

In late 1626 or early 1627, Artemisia left Rome again and went to Venice, attracted by its lively art scene. Here she probably met Simon Vouet and Nicolas Régnier, whom she had already met in Rome.

Artemisia felt at home among the artists of Venice and even became a member of the Accademia de' Desiosi, an informal literary academy. But after only three years, she left Venice and accepted an invitation from the Spanish viceroy to go to Naples.

Naples, England and back again

By the summer of 1630, Artemisia Gentileschi was an integral part of the artistic life of the city. Her patron, the viceroy Fernando Afán Enríquez de Ribera, 3rd Duke of Alcalá, also arranged commissions for her in Spain. Her clients included the sister of the Spanish King Philip IV, the Infanta María of Spain.

She became friends with Massimo Stanzione, one of the leading artists of the Neapolitan School. He also played an important role in obtaining commissions. He visited her in her studio every day to watch her paint. They subtly influenced each other's art without adopting each other's style.
Together with him and the painter Paolo Finoglia, she worked on a 6-part cycle of paintings on the life of St John. She took on the part entitled "The Birth of St John the Baptist" (see cover).

In general, Artemisia is always ready to develop her style and expand her repertoire. She began to paint portraits in Rome, and soon added allegories and literary themes to her subjects in Naples.

The artistic DNA: the pioneers of Artemisia's art

Artemisia Gentileschi's work reveals various artistic influences that have shaped her development as an artist. Some of the most prominent influences are:

Caravaggio: Artemisia was greatly influenced by Caravaggio. He was one of the leading Baroque painters and a friend of her father. It is very likely that Artemisia herself knew him. She admired Caravaggio's dramatic use of light and shadow and his realistic depiction of the human figure. Artemisia incorporated elements of Caravaggism into her own style, including the use of chiaroscuro and the emphasis on emotional intensity in her work.

Orazio Gentileschi: As her father and mentor, Orazio Gentileschi, himself influenced by Caravaggio's style, shaped Artemisia's artistic development. Not only did she learn the basics of painting from him, but she also adopted his sense of composition and his penchant for dramatic scenes.

Roman antiquity: Artemisia also drew on the art of Roman antiquity, particularly the sculptures and reliefs she had studied in Rome. Her interest in the depiction of the human figure and dramatic gestures can be traced back to these ancient models.

Final stations

Artemisia does not like living in Naples. She repeatedly writes in her letters that she wants to leave the city - yet she is fully recognised and accepted in the Neapolitan art scene. She runs her own workshop and even employs men. Finally, she receives her first public commission and paints her first altarpiece: The Annunciation.

As a result, against her stated wishes, Artemisia spent most of her career in Naples.

In 1638, however, she travelled to London for a few years, presumably at the invitation of Charles I himself. At this time, her father Orazio was also in London as court painter, commissioned to paint a ceiling in the Great Hall of the Queen's House in Greenwich. He was asked to paint an allegory of peace. It is thought that Artemisia helped him with this, but there is no evidence of this.

Orazio died unexpectedly in the spring of 1639 and Artemisia stayed on for the time being. She may have completed some of Orazio's commissions. However, little is actually known about Artemisia's work during this period. All we know is that she left London when the English Civil War broke out in 1642.

She returned to Naples and, as far as we know, never left the city again. In 1652, she signed her last work - a Susanna and the Elders, like her first signed painting, which she did at the age of 16.

The date of Artemisia's death is unknown. In 1654, she is said to have paid an overdue tax bill. Between 1656 and 1658 the plague ravaged Naples, killing more than half the city's population. Perhaps Artemisia was one of its victims.

What is certain is that she is buried in the cemetery of the church of San Giovanni di Fiorentini in Naples. However, her gravestone was lost during restoration work. Only two words are said to have been carved into the marble: Heic Artemisia - Here lies Artemisia.

Renaissance of an artist: Artemisia's rediscovery

In 1916, the Italian art historian Roberto Longhi published an essay entitled “Gentileschi, padre e figlia”, “Gentileschi, father and daughter”. 

It was the first time that he treated Artemisia Gentileschi as an artist in her own right. He began by distinguishing Artemisia's work from that of her father, Orazio. Until then, many of her paintings had been attributed to him, Caravaggio and other Baroque painters, even when signed by Artemisia. Why? Such technical virtuosity could not be attributed to a woman.

Longhi acknowledges Artemisia as an outstanding personality on the Italian art scene and emphasises her extraordinary mastery of various artistic techniques. He was particularly impressed by her representation of female figures. He emphasised the equality of women and men in her works, both in terms of content and appearance.

This was a turning point in the appreciation of Artemisia Gentileschi. Other art historians, curators and other experts became involved and a process of rediscovery and appreciation of her work gradually began.

The 1960s and 1970s saw a further upsurge in interest in Artemisia Gentileschi. Feminist art theorists began to reassess the work of women artists of the past and to emphasise their contributions to art history.

Research and exhibitions on Artemisia Gentileschi are on the rise, and her work is receiving increasing international attention. The combination of more intensive research, feminist interpretation and a general change in art historiography has led to Artemisia Gentileschi's contribution to art history finally being recognised. Today, her works fetch millions of euros on the art market.

Icon of female art

Artemisia Gentileschi's work is not only important from an art historical perspective, but also from a feminist perspective. Her depictions of strong, determined female figures challenged traditional role models and inspired generations of female artists. Her legacy shows that art knows no gender boundaries and that women's voices can no longer be ignored in art history.

How do you feel about Artemisia Gentileschi and her legacy? Has her work changed the way you look at art and feminism? Do you know of other women artists who explore similar themes or styles?
I look forward to reading your thoughts and which female artists inspire you!