

It’s said he spent most of the 1890s
in Munich. Drunk.
Lovis Corinth (1858-1925) was a German artist and writer whose whose work fused impressionism & expressionism into a brutal concoction all his own. His nudes expose his style perfectly. They’re not pretty, they are visceral meat. But they are honest and real and wonderful.
Corinth studied in Paris & in Munich joined the Berlin Sucession group, later becoming the group’s president. His early work was naturalistic in approach. Corinth was initially antagonistic towards the expressionist movement, but after a stroke in 1911 his style loosened and took on many expressionistic qualities. His use of color became more vibrant, and he created portraiture & landscapes of extraordinary vitality and power. Corinth’s subject matter also included biblical scenes. And nudes, and biblical scenes with nudes.
Perhaps his finest accolade came after he died. During the Third Reich, Corinth’s work was declared “degenerate art” by the regime and, in 1937, Nazi authorities rounded up and removed 295 of his works from public collections, and transported seven of them to Munich and displayed them as examples in the now famous Degenerate Art Exhibition of March 1937. Let’s start with 2 of Corinth’s paintings we know were in the “degenearte” exhibition; Self portrait with Model (1903) and Innocence (c. 1890).

Self portrait with Model. (1903.)
The model is Charlotte, who became Corinth’s muse and preferred model. She was to stay for the rest of his life. They married in 1903, the year of this painting; he was 44; she was 22.

Innocence. (c. 1890.)








and Champagne Glass (1902).















