Else Meidner

Else Meidner, nee Meyer ( born September 2, 1901 in Berlin, † May 5, 1987 in London) was a German painter and graphic artist.

Life

Else Meidner comes from a wealthy Jewish family. Against the opposition of parents she decides to study art and shows up so talented that Käthe Kollwitz and Max Slevogt pay attention to it and encourage it. The painter Ludwig Meidner, in the artist scene already a size and twice as old as she recognizes her talent and falls in love with her; 1927 to marry both, the wedding ceremony of Leo Baeck is completed.

First, still standing in the shadow of her husband, Else Meidner soon developed its own distinctive style, which is attributable to the Expressionism, first in her drawings, then even with the paintings, which she chooses a addition to portraits and self-portraits as well as landscapes and still life subjects. In 1933 the Jewish prohibition in 1939, a few days before the war began, both emigrate after they have their son David already sent forward to London. There she finds while back to a more colorful style, the 137 paintings and more than one thousand drawings, the person making it, however, remain the exception of some smaller shows, largely unnoticed during her lifetime.

Only years after her death, her art was rediscovered. 2002 presented the Jewish Museum Frankfurt their work together with those of her husband.