MAX LIEBERMANN German, 1847-1935

Max Liebermann was a German-Jewish painter best known as a leader of the Impressionist movement in Germany, and as one of the founders of the avant-garde Berlin Secession. Liebermann’s work is very close in style to Édouard Manet in its thick impasto and tonal palette, deftly rendering landscapes and figures with a practiced hand that demonstrated the artist’s strong understanding of realism. He also painted over 200 commissioned portraits during his lifetime, notably including one of the famed physicist Albert Einstein. Born on July 20, 1847 in Berlin, Germany to a wealthy family, Liebermann studied painting in Weimar, the Netherlands, and Paris after originally pursuing law and philosophy. His work can be found in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. He died on February 8, 1935 in Berlin and, though he had been famous and a well-respected member of the artistic community, his death was not reported in the media—which was then under Nazi control. While there were no representatives of the Academy of the Arts or the city at his funeral, the importance of this Jewish artist’s work was once again appreciated after the end of the war.