Expressionism: still shocking after all these years

Max Pechstein, 1910

These days an exhibition is being held in Stockholm. At the Millesgaarden museum, 150 works of painting and graphics belonging to the German expressionism are shown, by, among others, Emil Nolde, Otto Mueller and Max Pechstein.These masterpieces are borrowed from the Häuptli collection at Aargauer Kunsthaus in Switzerland and from the Osthaus-Museum in Hagen, Germany. These two collections contain outstanding works from various stages of the expressionist art produced in Germany during the period 1905-1938.

Expressionism scandalized the public back in that period, and one could think people are harder to shock these days. Not so : Max Pechstein’s picture of a young girl comfortably laying on a couch and with red painted lips was too much for some of the visitors. But ours is a time when voices are raised against the exhibition of paintings by the French artist Balthus, supposedly pedophilic. And, in a recent Expressionist show at the Tate Modern in London, a warning against potentially upsetting pictures was posted at one of the rooms.

At Tate Modern

Emil Nolde

Christian Rohlfs

Gabriele Münter