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Starting from 1905 and working up to a crescendo in the 1920s, German art saw an incredible flowering of brilliance in the early decades of the last century. The art movement which encapsulates the work of many different artists and smaller aesthetic cross-currents is called German Expressionism. The formation of the Br�cke artists� group in Dresden by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Erich Heckel, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff and Fritz Bleyl in 1905 is usually seen as the starting pistol for the whole Expressionist movement. Things developed very quickly from there. Emil Nolde and Max Pechstein joined Br�cke the following year, and Vassily Kandinsky and Oskar Kokoschka began working in a similar vein. Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Elbhafen Lithograph, 1907 Wassily Kandinsky, Orientalisches Woodcut, 1911 Wassily Kandinsky, Motif aus improvisation 25: The Garden of Love Woodcut, 1911 Oskar Kokoschka, Madchenbildnis Lithograph, 1920 Lists of the major artists of German Expressionism usually include all the arti

As soon as I saw this etching by Max Slevogt of a black panther, I thought of Rainer Maria Rilke's 1902 or 1903 poem Der Panther, written as a response to Rilke's friend Rodin's urging to work directly from life. So as I had a bit of time on holiday this week, I tried to make my own version of Rilke's poem. I wouldn't call it a translation, as apart from retaining the four quatrains, I have ignored the form of the original - the metre and the rhyme. The best proper translation I know is that of my late friend Stephen Cohn in Neue Gedichte: New Poems (Carcanet, 1992). I didn't have this with me while I sat and struggled with the hilarious responses of Google Translate, but I did have the sensitive translation of Susan Ranson from Rainer Maria Rilke: Selected Poems (OUP, 2011). Back home I have taken the precaution of checking Google's grasp of German with the literal prose translation of Patrick Bridgwater in Twentieth-Century German Verse (Penguin, 1963). An

K�the Kollwitz and Paula Modersohn-Becker are the two most famous female artists in early twentieth-century Germany, but they were by no means alone: there are plenty of interesting women working alongside them. Gabriele M�nter, Jacoba van Heemskerck, and Marianne von Werefkin are just three of the more well-known names. As I've recently acquired two etchings by Kollwitz, I thought I'd post these alongside some work by other female artists of the period with less of a public profile. K�the Kollwitz was born K�the Schmidt in K�nigsberg in 1867. She made her initial studies at an art school for women in Berlin, where her teacher was Karl Stauffer-Bern; she then went to the Women's Art School in Munich. From 1891 she lived and worked in Berlin, where her husband Karl was a doctor. Kollwitz is widely recognised as one of the most important etchers of her day. Her art expresses a profound sympathy with the lives of the poor, as in her early masterworks for the series The Revolt

Everyone knows what to expect from the Norwegian Expressionist, Edvard Munch. As he himself put it,  "Sickness, insanity and death were the angels that surrounded my cradle, and they have followed me throughout my life." His most famous painting, The Scream, brilliantly expresses the sense of anxiety and instability that tormented him. Until now, I had only had one print by Munch, a Norwegian landscape that trembles with neurasthenia. It was the first piece of art he created after his devastating mental breakdown in 1908. Edvard Munch Landschaft (Norwegian landscape) Drypoint, 1908 Ref: Woll, Edvard Munch: The Complete Graphic Works, 298 state ii/iii But now I have a second Munch print, another drypoint, that emanates happiness and friendship, and a simple pleasure in life. The two couldn't be more different. It's a 1905 portrait of Erdmuter Luchsinger, the daughter of his friend Herbert Esche, then aged around three. I expect her smiling face cheered Munch up, at lea

Karl Hofer, N�chtliche �berfahrt (Night journey) Etching with aquatint, 1899 When I first saw this haunting etching with aquatint, I wasn't sure who the artist was. Paul Klee? Marc Chagall? Both seemed likely possibilities. But in fact it's a very early work, predating both Klee and Chagall, by the German Expressionist Karl Hofer. Born in 1878 in Karlsruhe, Karl Christian Ludwig Hofer (sometimes listed as Carl Hofer) studied at the Karlsruhe Academy of Fine Art from 1896-1900; this stiking etching was made while he was still a student. Karl Hofer, T�nzerin Lithograph, 1921 Although a prominent member of the Expressionist movement, Karl Hofer was never associated with one particular group. In common with most Expressionists, Karl Hofer's art was condemned as degenerate by the Nazis; one hundred and fifty of his canvases were destroyed in his studio. After the war, Karl Hofer was appointed Director of the Hochschule f�r Bildende Kunst in Berlin. He died in Berlin in 1955. The

Felix Meseck was born in Danzig in 1883, and died in Holzminden in 1955. Meseck studied at the Fine Art Academies in Berlin and K�nigsberg, studying painting under Ludwig Dettmann and printmaking with Heinrich Wolff. In 1926 he was appointed professor at the Weimar Academy, a post from which he was forced out by the Nazis. Before WWI, in which he served at the front as an ordinary soldier, Meseck concentrated on painting; after the war he turned to printmaking, becoming especially known for his etchings and drypoints. Meseck was a member of the Berlin Secession, and contributed to leading journals such as Ganymed , as well as illustrating works by Shakespeare, Goethe, Novalis, and Brentano. Much of Felix Meseck's work was destroyed in the Red Army attack on Danzig in 1945. Felix Meseck, Landschaft Etching, 1920s Felix Meseck's art is a curious blend of Expressionism, Romanticism and Symbolism, with a forlorn, desolate quality at its heart. His spiky, unsettling line is the oppo

In 1937, 1,052 of his works were removed from German museums by the Nazis, more than by any other artist. 29 choice canvases were selected for the infamous exhibition of Degenerate Art; and no doubt many others were destroyed. In 1941 he was expelled from the Reichskunstkammer, the German Artists� Association, and forbidden not just to exhibit or sell his work, but even to paint. However he continued creating art in secret, stockpiling hundreds of little watercolours, his �Unpainted Pictures�, which sing with vibrant colour.          So he must be a hero, right?          If only it weren�t for the inconvenient fact that this persecuted artist was also a keen, fully paid-up member of the Nazi party. He only joined the party in 1934, after Hitler had been elected Chancellor, and it may have been that this was a pragmatic, opportunistic move. Or perhaps he was seduced by Nazi dreams of a renewal of pure German folk culture. Or maybe he was an out-and-out fascist, who had supported the N