Art Calendar – Current Exhibitions in Germany

Many tourists who come to Worpswede near Bremen want to see artists. The town is renowned for its artist colony, founded in 1889. In 1897 Paula Modersohn-Becker also made a visit to the colony – and stayed to be an artist. She was one of the so-called “painting women” – a derogatory term used for women in the early twentieth century who publicly exhibited their art.

Four special exhibitions in the Worpsweder Museum are dedicated to Paula Modersohn-Becker and other pioneers who, despite lack of academic training in what was then the masculine domain of art, succeeded in pursuing their chosen careers. Among the artists displayed are Julie Wolfthorn and Martha Vogeler. Wolfthorn was known primarily for her portraits and championed during her entire life women artists and their admission to art academies. She died in 1944 in the concentration camp Theresienstadt; the Nazis banned her works as “degenerate art”. Martha Vogeler wanted to preserve traditional elements and specialized in textile folk art in her hand and tapestry weaving. She was already active as an artist before her divorce from the painter Heinrich Vogeler; thereafter she established a weaving mill and a local history museum, and so said goodbye to the passive role of playing the muse and model for her husband.