Expressionism prioritized raw emotion over accurate representation. Emerging in Germany around 1905, artists distorted form and used intense, non-naturalistic colors to express inner psychological states. Edvard Munch's The Scream (1893) anticipated the movement, its anguished figure becoming an icon of modern anxiety.
Two German groups defined the movement. Die Brücke (The Bridge), founded in Dresden, included Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and Emil Nolde, who used jagged forms and clashing colors. Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) in Munich included Wassily Kandinsky, Franz Marc, and Paul Klee, moving toward abstraction while maintaining emotional intensity.
After World War I, New Objectivity artists like Otto Dix and George Grosz turned Expressionist distortion toward social criticism, depicting the horrors of war and Weimar decadence. The Nazis condemned Expressionism as "degenerate art," confiscating thousands of works. Today, major collections exist at the MoMA, German museums, and the Tate Modern.
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Edvard Munch, Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani and 12 more