Emil Nolde

Emil Nolde is one of the leading representatives of Expressionism. For the painter and graphic artist, who was a member of Die Brücke group of artists from 1906–07, colour was the most important means of artistic expression. Influenced by van Gogh, Gauguin and Munch the object-related shapes in his compositions take second place to liberal and bold applications of colour. In his pictures of flowers, landscapes and seascapes in particular the artist also felt the spiritual wonder of nature. His religious works and grotesque visions are also a reflection of his search for the spiritual. Nolde, who moved from the border of Germany and Denmark to Seebüll in 1927, always felt closely tied to his German homeland. Even under the Nazi regime, the controversial painter never lost hope at receiving official recognition as a national artist. In 1934 he joined the Nationalsozialistische Arbeitsgemeinschaft Nordschleswig (NSAN) that was merged into the NSDAP in 1935. Nevertheless, more than 1000 works by Nolde were confiscated and labelled ‘degenerate’ in 1937; many of them forming highlights at the ‘Degenerate Art’ exhibition. Due to ‘a lack of trustworthiness’ Nolde was banned from painting in 1941.

Although Flechtheim was also critical of Expressionism he exhibited the slighted but popular artist in his gallery for marketing reasons. Flechtheim showed works by Emil Nolde that were already highly valued on the German art market in the 1920s in five group exhibitions in Düsseldorf. No solo exhibition for the painter, who openly polemicised French art,

was ever held. Many of Nolde’s most faithful collectors and patrons came from the Rhineland area and it was here that Flechtheim made his only sale of a work by Nolde to a museum. Before the gallery owner had even exhibited works by the artist for the first time in 1921, he had arranged for the sale of an oil painting by Emil Nolde to the Kunstmuseum in Düsseldorf in 1919.