Paula Modersohn-Becker
Geburtstagsgast im Kunstmuseum
06.02. – 03.04.2011

This year marks the 125th anniversary of the Kunstverein Bremerhaven, and we are delighted to be able to present you with a special birthday guest - Paula Modersohn-Becker.
In the year of the artist’s birthday, the exhibition closes a historical gap in our program, because during the artist’s lifetime, the exhibition activities of the Kunstverein Bremerhaven, which was run on a voluntary basis at the time, were largely dormant. It was not until 1909, two years after her death, that the association’s activities were revived. Among other things, the Kunstverein organized an exhibition of works by Worpswede artists in 1913 on the occasion of the joint trade exhibition of the Lower Weser towns, but it remains unknown whether works by Paula Modersohn-Becker were also shown there.
There are indications that the association’s board was interested in a work by the artist in the 1920s, but neither a purchase nor an exhibition took place in Bremerhaven. Decades more had to pass before paintings and etchings could be acquired for the collection in the 1950s. Today they are among the most valuable works of art in Bremerhaven. By purchasing further works by Worpswede artists such as Heinrich Vogeler, Richard Oelze and a large Otto Modersohn exhibition in the early 1960s, the Kunstverein Bremerhaven kept the artists from Fischerhude and Worpswede in the spotlight. Unfortunately, an exhibition with works by Paula Modersohn-Becker never took place. In this respect, it is a great pleasure that this art-historical gap in the exhibition program has now been closed.

Our thanks go to the lender, Dr. Wolfgang Kauffmann. The complex of his Paula Modersohn-Becker works undoubtedly forms the most art-historically valuable part of his remarkable and extensive collection, which was formerly in Stade and is now a must for art-loving visitors in the Museum am Modersohn-Haus in Worpswede.

Fate granted the painter only a short period of creativity until her death in 1907. Nevertheless, her art placed her in the forefront of European modernism. Even if the significance of this fact was not recognized at the time, her avant-garde position within the emerging expressionism is undisputed today.
In 1895, Paula Modersohn-Becker saw the paintings of the Worpswede artists’ circle for the first time in the Bremen Kunsthalle; two years later, Worpswede became the center of her life. Fascinated by the landscape and its play of colors, the solitude of the place and the artists who lived there, she devoted herself entirely to painting. She took art lessons from the founders of the artist community Fritz Mackensen and later from Otto Modersohn, whom she married in 1901. Under this influence, her oeuvre includes both pure landscape paintings and depictions of people, which testify to the strong influence of Worpswede.
She devoted particular artistic attention to the people in her immediate surroundings. Her immediate coexistence with the farmers and poorhouse residents of the moor village is still noticeable today. She always managed to capture the respective type, the simplicity of ordinary people, clearly and without describing the mood.
The four trips to Paris that Paula Modersohn-Becker made from 1900 onwards not only confirmed her artistic path. At the same time, she also became bolder and freer in her depiction, the reduced design, the effect of the multi-layered paint and the use of the neutral background.
The small special exhibition at the Kunstmuseum Bremerhaven with works from the years 1900 to 1905 traces this development. The high-calibre works offer a comprehensive insight into Paula Modersohn-Becker’s artistic oeuvre. They also form a wonderful temporary addition to the Kunstverein’s own works in Worpswede. The exhibition is complemented by a supporting programme with lectures and films.