German Artists' Writings in the XX Century: Max Pechstein's, 'Erinnerungen' (Memoirs), List Verlag, 1963

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German Artists' Writings in the XX Century - 2

Max Pechstein
Erinnerungen (Memoirs)
Edited by Leopold Reidemeister

List Verlag, 1963, pp. 132

(Review by Francesco Mazzaferro)

[Original Version September 2014 - New Version April 2019]

Fig 1) The Front-cover of the most recent edition of the Memoirs, published by DVA in 1993, as facsimile edition of the first edition printed in 1960 by Limes Publishers

The Memoirs of Max Pechstein: history of the publication between 1947 and 1960

After the memoirs of Karl Hofer, in this article we will deal with those of Max Pechstein (1881-1955). They were printed in three versions: the first in 1960 (an elegant edition, with 105 drawings by the author, by the publisher Limes in Wiesbaden); the second in 1963 (a paperback edition for the types of List in Monaco, with just 14 designs) and the third in 1993 (this is a re-edition of the 1960 issue with 105 designs - even the cover is the same - by the publisher DVA, Stuttgart, with an afterword by Karin von Maur). All editions are now out of print and are available only in libraries or on the antiquities market. There appears to have been no translation into any other language. If one draws a comparison between the Memoirs (Erinnerung) of Pechstein and the German success of the memoirs of Nolde and the even international one of the memoirs by Klee, it is difficult to say that they have enjoyed great fortune. 

This does not mean that the story of the Memoirs of Max Pechstein is not full of interesting implications for the history of the art sources of the twentieth century in Germany. The text was prepared - as we shall see - by the German painter (victim of Nazi persecution) immediately after the war. It was originally due to be published in East Germany (then the Soviet occupation zone). Pechstein had been since 1919 very close to extreme left positions, even though he had not supported the violence of the Spartacus League (1) and had sided with the Social Democrats, in defense of the Weimar Republic. Later on, Pechstein voted for the Social Democrats, but he also continued to produce works supporting the Soviet Union (among other things, a poster in solidarity of the USSR), until the seizure of power by Hitler. Most likely he tended to medians positions between social democracy and communism. Not surprisingly, he signed a contract with the publisher Aufbau-Verlag in East Berlin for the publication of his Memoirs. He deposited the manuscript ready for printing in 1946. He made however some changes in 1947.

In the meantime, however, the Cold War prevented the publication. There was no space anymore for a dialogue within the various souls of the left. The German Communist regime aligned itself with the Soviet Union, who had not considered at all German expressionism with a good eye. Although the Expressionists were persecuted by the Nazis, expressionism was considered by communists as a bourgeois style, weak, formalistic, and not in line with socialist realism. Expressionists were actually accused of failing to react to the Nazi threat, and not to have taken the side of the proletariat. The poor Pechstein - who was born in Saxony and then in an area occupied by Soviet troops - fell out from the frying pan into the fire, passing from the Nazi ostracism to the communist one. 

But he had the wisdom to settle down in time to West Berlin, where he spent the last years of his life (he died in 1955) among controversies with West German art critics, who preferred Emil Nolde, his historic enemy since 1910 -1911, to him. 

Until his death, the Memoirs remained unpublished. It was the widow (his second wife Marta) to address herself to an art historian, Leopold Reidemeister, who had devoted his critic career, once war had finished, to the painters of the 'Group of the Bridge' (Brücke), leading to the opening of the 'Bridge Museum' (Brücke-Museum) in West Berlin in the second half of the sixties. In Berlin, a year before the construction of the Wall, Reidemeister edited the Memoirs that were eventually published in West-Germany, and notably in Wiesbaden, in 1960. Drafted therefore to be published in East Berlin in 1947, the Memoirs were printed thirteen years after, by one of the art critics of the 'enemy' Germany. 

In the introduction to the Memoirs, Leopold Reidemeister explains that the text was dictated by Pechstein to a secretary - in a situation of extreme precariousness and having no original document any longer in his hands - after all documents had been destroyed by the war. It is however not entirely clear what happened. At least part of the Memoirs, as we shall see, was devoted to the trip to Palau, and it is very likely that they existed in a previous manuscript. Whatever happened, Reidemeister writes that he rightly decided not to change anything in the text by the artist, if not correcting some errors in the chronology of events and adding the drawings of the painter. 

Fig. 2) The monograph on Max Pechstein published by Max Osborn for Propylaen-Verlag (Berlin) in 1922

If there is an element to be considered is that, while the Memoirs were certainly not a great success in the 1960s, the publication of the biography in 1922 by the art critic Max Osborn, during the Weimar Republic (actually performed in close cooperation with the artist) was a publishing success. According to Bernard Fulda and Aika Soya - authors of an excellent recent monograph on the rise and fall of the fortunes of Pechstein in a century of German history (2) - the painter "in the late forties modelled many passages of his own autobiography on the correspondent chapters of the biography by Osborn." So the 1922 biography by Osborn was perhaps used in 1946-1947 by the painter, who had lost all documents in the bombing of the house in Berlin, to reconstruct the main lines of the narrative of his autobiography. Moreover, Osborn had lavished compliments on the painter, so as to define the entry of Pechstein in the group of the 'Bridge' (Bridge) in Dresden as the moment of the birth of modern painting in Germany. The reality, then, is this: Pechstein enjoyed years of great personal success in the early decades of the twentieth century; but his work has experienced a rapid decline, so that, in the 60s, his Memoirs passed largely unnoticed. 

The experience of the 'Bridge'

That of Pechstein is an important story for German and European art in general. He was one of the "inventors" of expressionism. Four young artists, Heckel, Kirchner, Schmidt-Rottluff and Bleyel had created the 'Bridge' group (Die Brücke) in Dresden in 1905. Pechstein joined them in 1906, then 24 years old, providing a decisive contribution in terms of style and techniques used by the group. It was Pechstein to maintain the Bridge’s relations with other groups expressionists, such as 'The Blue Rider' (Blaue Reiter) in Monaco (he exhibited with them in 1912) and the magazine 'The Tempest' (Sturm) in Berlin, and even with the 'Beast' (Fauves) by Henry Matisse in Paris, where - according to the Memoirs - the artist took part in the group exhibition in 1908 (actually, Fulda and Soika, examining archival materials, strongly doubt he had personal ties with the French painters; certainly, he had made his acquaintance with Kees van Dongen, the Dutch member of the Fauves, with whom - among other things – he could probably speak German. He tried in vain to convince him to participate in the activities of the "Bridge" in Dresden). 

The painters of the 'Bridge' were very young, penniless and looking for a common pictorial language. They found it, and they also found the support of the first fans (among whom we must count important art critics) on the one hand, and the fierce criticism of detractors on the other one. If you forgive the analogy, we could say that the members of the 'Bridge' were almost like a rock band. Moreover, as all rock-bands, those were the days when expressionist groups were born, changed direction and composition, and died at unthinkable speeds, typically every three to five years. And not everything had the hoped success: Pechstein and Kirchner had founded in 1911 a school of art in common, which resolved itself in a complete failure, as the Memoirs themselves reveal. Or, it could happen that one of their members was expelled: it is exactly what happened to Pechstein in 1912, thrown out of the “Bridge” after he had decided to expose "solo". In 1913 the 'Bridge' broke up after eight years of life: a relatively long time. 

Of all the painters of the 'Bridge', Pechstein was at the same time the only one with an academic education, but also the only one whose family came from the working world, particularly from the industrial city of Zwickau, at the time bastion of the left. There are youth memories that are indelible: the painter says in his Memoirs, for example, that he had seen there the army firing on the crowd.

The relationship with Italy 

Pechstein was also the member who enjoyed most strongly the charm of Italian art. In Italy it was several times since 1907. In 1906 he had won the State Award of Saxony for Art, also called "Rome Prize": a scholarship that allowed winning artists to stay three months in our country at the expense of Academy of fine Arts in Dresden, and to have a painting atelier at their disposal in Rome. 

On that first trip in 1907, he wrote in his Memoirs that he did not want to use the studio that had been reserved for his work as a painter in Rome, but preferred to visit Italy in the length and breadth (Verona, Padova, Venice, Ravenna, Bologna, Florence, Pisa, Siena, Rome, Naples, Sicily, Genoa, Parma and Milan). He was strongly influenced by our primitives and late antiquity: "I'm thrilled by the frescoes of Giotto, Fra Angelico, Ravenna, mosaics of San Apollinare Nuovo and the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia. I got in love with the remains of Etruscan art and discovered the depictions of the ancient wall paintings in the Vatican Library, which I still did not know in their majesty. I caught the landscape and the people around me in my eyes." The Memoirs of 1960 contain a series of Italian sketches: the Mausoleum of Theodoric in Ravenna, various views of Venice. During the trip he sent a series of letters to his best friend, the painter Alexander Gerbig. From them one learns that had bad relations with other German artists who were in Rome at that time (because they behaved as squeamish against the Italians). During his stay in Italy he produced mainly landscapes and reproductions of buildings (- no Italian Italian lady has ever wanted to get portrayed by me, even dressed - he writes ironically to Gerbig). There is no evidence of contacts with Italian artists in 1907, at least in the Memoirs. 

In 1910 Pechstein also exhibited an etching ("A Bridge") at the Venice Biennale. Apparently he left a good memory. In 1911 he was officially invited by the House of Savoy to participate in the celebrations for the fiftieth anniversary of Italian unification, for two weeks (all expensed by the ruling house). A unique opportunity: he took the opportunity to marry his Lotte and make his honeymoon in Italy at the expense of our administration. He wrote: "And even during this new, albeit more short, trip, there are several issues on which I have now more clear ideas, and they were important for my sensibility." In Italy he returned, for a third study trip to Tuscany and Liguria, in 1913, a year after he had been expelled from the 'Bridge'. These were months of great success for the painter, who was celebrated in Berlin with a solo exhibition at the Gurlitt Gallery. At the same time, as demonstrated by Fulda and Soika, Pechstein was the subject of increasing hostility on the part of other painters (Nolde, Marc, Macke). A good reason to get away and enjoy a new Italian journey. 

In those years, the 'Rome Secession ' was born, where even Pechstein exhibited; the group of the 'Rome Secession' - with painters such as Casorati and Spadini - had perhaps the most forward-looking dialogue with artists outside Italy (though mainly to France). Italy was characterised by similar thrills as those in Germany. One year later, in 1914 'New Trends' (Nuove Tendenze) was created in Milan, the ' Bologna Secession ' was established and an 'exhibition of the rejected' by the Biennale di Venezia was also held. Beside the participation in the exposure of the 'Rome Secession', there is no other evidence however that Pechstein had contact with Italian artists. 

The Italian journeys were never for Pechstein simply an occasion to make holiday. It was in our country that he was confronted for the first time with a problem that was posed by the peculiarities of the landscape, where often houses and castles were perched on top of a hill: "This forced me to find solutions to divide the surface into the framework" and hence "to confront myself with the problems of Cubism, and with the laws of light and shadow." That year he found his paradise-retreat in Monterosso a Mare in the Cinque Terre (which he visited again in 1924 and a last time in 1925). (3)

The Italian stay in 1913 coincides with a change of style, as demonstrated not only by the landscapes of the Italian villages perched on the mountains, but also by one of his most famous paintings, made in Monterosso: the 'Fishermen boat'. To the same type of painting Pechstein also returned in 1924, with the “Italian bearers of stone” and in 1925 with 'Hauling the boat'. Monterosso a mare was in fact the place where the artist produced on several occasions a painting of a more monumental nature. Let's face it: a more Italian painting. 

The Italian experience also consists of exhibitions and awards. In Venice, the artist exhibited again two oil paintings ('Rowboat' and 'Still Life') and three colour lithographs ('The Bathers', 'Bathers II' and 'Within the harem') at the Biennale of 1922, an edition of the art exhibition particularly important for Germany, which resurfaced again in the field of art to the eyes of the international public opinion, after the military defeat and the dissolution of the Empire. In 1930 he received an award in Milan. Unfortunately I could not find out what it precisely was. It must be said that the Triennial of Art was held in Milan in 1930; in those years, Marisa Sarfatti coordinated the 'Group Twentieth Century' (Gruppo Novecento) in Milan. In the same years when Pechstein began to be hampered by the Nazi pressure in Germany, he was appreciated by Marfatti the main theorist of modern art of Italian fascism, who mentions him in his "History of modern painting", also from 1930. Pechstein then returned to exhibit in Italy at the historical Venice Biennale of 1948, the first set up after the war, for an exhibition on the so-called German degenerate art, prepared by Roberto Longhi.

Fig. 3) The commemorative stamp for the 100th anniversary of the birth of Max Pechstein, representing 'Italian bearers of stones', 1925. The painting is kept at the ‘Bridge Museum' (Brücke-Museum) in Berlin. 

The years of success 

The relationship with Italy was essential to the painter, and helped him find a personal pictorial language that, on the one hand, placed him among the innovators of German Expressionists, for the sake of color, and on the other retained formal classic elements. 

Pechstein was the first artist of the 'Bridge' to establish himself commercially (in the autobiography, he recalls with great pride that one of his first customers was the future Chancellor Walter Rathenau and that with 300 marks for the sale of the painting he had managed to make an entire summer holidays). In the second decade of 1900 success and recognition arrived, and Pechstein began chairing the 'New Secession' in Berlin, the one of the expressionists. Then he decided to go on a long journey to the island of Palau (extra-European travelling was a contagious fashion among painters; in the same years, Nolde reached New Guinea, while Paul Klee, August Macke and Louis Moilliet were in Tunisia) . The First World War took him by surprise, with the occupation of Palau by the Japanese (who were lined up alongside the Franco-British). Just as happened in Nolde, Pechstein was able to return to Germany only after a long and dangerous journey, even crossing Great Britain with a fake identity. And as it happened to Klee, at his return he was immediately enlisted in the German army, and had to fight. 

After the war, Pechstein joined the Revolution of November 1918, and even undertook to establish a Soviet of artists in 1919. When the newly formed Weimar Republic was under attack by armed gangs on the right and on the left of the political spectrum, however, he did not adhere to the Spartacus League, fearing the danger of civil war, and put himself at the disposal of the Social Democrats in power. 

Pechstein was one of the living symbols of the intense cultural life of Weimar Germany. It was certainly one of the five best-known German painters of the twenties. We must not forget - writes Christian Saehrendt (4) – that three monographs had already been dedicated to him before 1923: the first of Walter Heymann, 1916 (5); the second, signed in 1919 by Georg Bierman (6) contains a long autobiographical letter (7), addressed on 6 August 1919 by the painter himself to Bierman (and somehow represents the core foundation of the Memoirs written in 1947); the third is the biography by Osborn of 1922 (we mentioned it at the beginning) (8).

Pechstein maintained strong and direct relations with the Republican social-democratic government, who gave him commissions (e.g., the beautiful stained glass windows for the International Labour Organization in Geneva) to represent German modern art (or ‘young German art’, as it was called at the time), abroad. The collaboration with the Social Democratic government did not prevent him, however, to remain close to  extreme left positions (still in 1925, he produced a poster of solidarity with the Soviet Union; he was also a member of the League for Human Rights and Socialism and the Union of the Friends of the Soviet Union). 

Nazism and post-war decline

For all these reasons Pechstein was among the first ones (together with the left wing of the Weimar painting, like Karl Hofer and some painters of the 'New Objectivity', i.e. Otto Dix and George Grosz) to be persecuted by the Nazis: he was forbidden to make any trip abroad, was added to the list of so-called 'degenerate art', was expelled from all academic institutions and was ultimately a victim of the absolute prohibition of exercising the artistic profession. He took refuge in Leba, a remote village on the eastern Pomerania, where he remained isolated for years, with his second wife Martha and his children. 

Shortly after World War II was ended, he hurried back to Berlin, where he found everything destroyed (house and studio) and in those conditions dictated his Memoirs between 1945 and 1946 to a secretary. He was able to obtain, thanks to Karl Hofer, a teaching; he shared with him the - lost - battle against abstract art. The post-war years, however, did not coincide with the return to success. The link to figurative art made ​​of Pechstein and Hofer (who coincidentally both died in 1955) the great misunderstood painters of that era. Unlike other contemporary artists (e.g. Nolde) it was still the form, and not the colour, to dominate his compositions. His deformations were not considered sufficient. The subjects were considered to be too simplified. In short, he was considered by some as a too moderate expressionist. This controversy will lead in 1953 to a tough battle, ended up in court, with Pechstein suing the jury of the German Association of Artists (Deutscher Künstlerbund) for not having allowed any of his paintings to the third national exhibition in Hamburg, because the jury preferred abstract expressionism. One of the greatest art critics of the time, Will Grohmann, accused him of narcissism and invited him to take the bus to Italy (9). The last few years (Stephanie Barron (10) tells us) were also characterized by his personal anger over the fact that those who had organized the repression - and in many cases - the destruction of modern art under the Nazis (he had lost a good half of his art production, partly because of the Nazi persecution and only in part due to the bombing) had not been brought to trial at Nuremberg; so that Pechstein went so far as to claim the creation of special German courts for this purpose.

In short, if in 1916 Pechstein was defined by Walther Heymann as "Giotto of our time", after the Second World War, the critique of West Germany ignored him: think about Werner Haftmann, the most valued expert of German painting of the twentieth century, who wrote in his first monograph on the painting in the twentieth century (11) in 1953: "Pechstein learned the style of the 'Bridge' as an opportunity to produce a naturalistic painting - rough, coloured in an unrefined way, and decorative – a painting that he sought in vain to make expressive with exterior means of exotic art." Even in 1986, in a 400-page work on degenerate art (with an introduction by Helmut Kohl), Haftmann only devoted half a page to Pechstein and did not publish any picture accompanying his brief comments (12). On the other side of the Iron Curtain, in East Germany, Pechstein suffered the same fate in 1948, this time for ideological reasons: as already mentioned, expressionist artists were considered bourgeois and ignored, until they were rediscovered in the eighties.

Fig. 4) The first exhibition of Max Pechstein at the Opera of (East) Berlin, in March 1946

Only in recent years there has been a late re-evaluation of Pechstein. See about it http://www.pechstein.de/index.html. Recently - in 2014 - a museum dedicated to him was opened in Zwickau, in which each room is associated with a phrase taken from the Memoirs. 

The (un)lucky Memoirs

To better assess the Memoirs in the context of the years in which they were published, we consulted three recent studies: the aforementioned essay by Bernard Fulda and Aya Soya, a monograph, also already mentioned, by Christian Saehrendt and a recent work of Petra Lewey, for the new museum of Zwickau (12). We felt it was also useful to read an impressive work of Horst Jähner on the 'Bridge' (13), published in the German Democratic Republic in 1984, because in it we saw the first attempt to re-evaluate the work of Pechstein, after decades of oblivion even in Communist Germany. After all, that was the political wing to which Pechstein looked with interest in the twenties, the peak of success, even if he remained faithful to the Weimar Republic. And it was for East Germany that he had written his Memoirs, published later only in the West. 

Let's face immediately. The first explanation for the lack of success of the Memoirs is the simplest. As a literary text and as sources of art history, the Memoirs are not entirely convincing. It is not so much the fact that it is only about 130 pages (brevity is always a merit). It is that there are at least three obvious limitations. 

First, the author does not seem to reflect deeply on the aesthetic reasons of the expressionist style, and the reading of the Memoirs does not give us a good overview of his artistic pursuits.

Second, the text is very unbalanced: in the edition of 1963, out of a total of 128 pages, nearly 40 are devoted to the permanence of Pechstein and his first wife on the island of Palau (where the outbreak of war surprised them); if you add the ten pages on their daring return to Europe, more than a third of Memoirs is dedicated to what happened in the space of just one year. 

Third, the Memoirs are a missed opportunity to document and explain the relationships that Pechstein had with other expressionist painters in Germany, but also with representatives of French and Italian art.

The fragility of aesthetic discussion 

It is unclear whether Pechstein was fully aware of the roots of its success, which he had when he was still very young. He speaks mainly of his dexterity, his ability to apply his inspiration in different techniques (mosaic, fresco, all kinds of prints, watercolour) and the good academic training received. Ultimately, though, the Memoirs do not give the image of an artist entirely convinced of his aesthetic choices. 

Fig. 5) The cover page of the second, paperback edition of Max Pechstein's memoirs, published by List in 1963

Pechstein speaks - of course – of the "new pictorial language" and the "new knowledge that I had gained in the use of colour and surfaces. And how I placed side by side colours directly on the background, with very heavy contours." We are at the beginning of the experience of the 'Bridge' between 1907 and 1909. 

Of 1910 is the explicit choice to simplify pictorial language and colourism, characterizing it with strong contrasts and a new enhancement of contours. 

From the Memoirs emerges the great love for nature, the sun, the sea, naked bodies, the countryside, fishermen, bathers; all subjects represented with bright colours, but not dramatically. Unlike other Expressionists, the goal of Pechstein is not at all that of psychologizing the nature, but to offer a solar and lively pictorial representation of it. Pechstein is a visual and decorative artist, in the sense that the visual reality of things - interpreted in Expressionist terms – completely exhausts his field of interest.

Even in the most politically engaged figurative forms (think of the revolutionary political posters, or the prints documenting the war) Pechstein never reached the levels of dramatization typical of other expressionist painters, like Grosz and Dix. The miseries of peace and the horrors of war are never made full explicit in their extreme reality. Pechstein therefore uses a lyrical evocative language all his own. 

All in all, the Memoirs are not a sufficient tool to appreciate the art of our author. The author lacks the ability to get out of the dimension of a sheer narration.

The imbalances in the drafting of Memoirs

The Memoirs raise a number of questions. We know from Fulda and Soika that Pechstein wrote thousands of letters to friends such as Alexander Gerbig for the entire life. The letters document all the key points of his biography, such as the letters sent from the front during the First World War, which include sketches of scenes of war and military life: why, however, the Memoirs seem to completely circumvent the First World War? It is likely that the answer is to be found in the trauma of the war experience. Pechstein fought for at least three years, and he was discharged for health reasons in 1917, when the war was still going on. His mental health was really bad. To this trauma of a secular nature, the artist added probably other shocks, this time of a more professional and personal nature. The Pechstein who comes from the war is a broken man; he tells us that he literally needs to re-learn anew how to paint. But painting saves him. He writes: "Despite my economic existence has been ruined by inflation and destroyed by the betrayal of my art dealer [note of the editor: Gurlitt], and although my marriage ended in divorce, I always had my job to rescue me." 

Fig. 6) Max Pechstein, Palau. Drawings and notes from the South Seas, published posthumous by Buchheim Verlag, 1956

It has already been said about the disproportionate weight reserved in the Memoirs to his stay on the island of Palau. Pechstein dedicates such a large and detailed space to it as to suggest that these pages were originally intended to be a text in itself. Both Max as well as his first wife Lotte kept a diary of the trip, enriching it with many sketches. It must be said that Pechstein originally intended to stay at least two years on the island (he moved there with forty boxes of materials); he probably hoped to produce a large amount of paintings and wanted to publish a book in return, so that he would be able to return a substantial sum received on loan from the art dealer Gurlitt. 

A third of the Memoirs refers to the events preceding the First World War. It is the most beautiful part. We read the story of a group of young people defying all conventions, suffering of being hungry, but finding his way to success. More than a narrative of events, it is a narrative of feelings. Moments of joy and despair are alternating, but the tone of the story is basically epic, celebratory, and optimistic. 

The third part (that of the Weimar Republic) is the most disappointing. The narrative becomes less effective and passionate. The war has left an indelible mark: success returned, but the enthusiasm of the pre-war years lacks. It is noticeable how - for the period 1918-1933 - the author chooses to frequently make claims of a general nature. The attention for the description of psychological conditions disappears. Pechstein says that, starting from 1918, expressionism had become the slave of mass production, but does not explain why. He tells of his participation in the socialist revolutionary movements, but does not cite the texts that he himself wrote. He refers to the new artistic movements of the Weimar Republic (for example, the 'New Objectivity') but does not explain what he thought of it. He refers to his active frequentation of literature clubs, but says nothing about the role he played there and his activities. He quotes the many magazines of art criticism and the most important art critics of Weimar Germany, but does not go into detail. He has a very harsh criticism on Gurlitt, the art dealer who had supported him earlier and had fed his wife and son during the war, but does not explain the exact terms of the problem. 

Therefore, the years between 1919 and 1933 receive proportionally little attention. Yet, these are also years of success: he remarries and has a second son; the government entrusts him with important orders; thanks to the Carnegie Foundation, he becomes famous in the United States; he is appointed member of the Prussian Academy of the Fine Arts; and still travels in France, Spain and Italy. When the Nazi calamity befalls him, he has a psychological breakdown, with pathological forms of dependency on sleep. He saves himself from total collapse by taking refuge in a remote place, in Leba, with his family, away from everything and everyone until the end of the War, when the Memoirs are interrupted. He does not mention the various abominations that suffered in the moment of his greatest weakness, as when Nolde reported him to the Gestapo as a Jew (in fact, it was not). Nothing is said of the last ten years, from 1945 until 1955.

A missed opportunity: the relationships with other artists

There are Memoirs in which the authors stress their difficulties to socialize, while others emphasise as core asset of their life the richness of friends. Those of Nolde, for example, are of the first type: they tend to overestimate the sense of isolation. The Memoirs of Pechstein belong to the second, especially in the first part. An example: the author tells us of the idyll of artistic production that he shared first with Heckel and then with Kirchner, when they spent two summers (1910 and 1911) to paint in common scantily dressed models in the beautiful nature around Dresden, at the Moritzburg lakes. He writes: "We lived in absolute harmony, worked and went continuously to swim." The only shadows are those of the relations with the introvert Schmidt-Rottluff. The story, however, remains always totally anecdotal (in one case they are surprised by a police officer along with the very young and almost nude models; and in another case they swim naked on an island, carrying the paintings on their head, etc..). When however problems arise, they are ignored; relations within the 'Bridge' deteriorate quickly, and within a few months Pechstein is not confirmed at the head of the 'New Secession' in Berlin (memorable, on that occasion, the clash he had with Nolde: they hated each other) and is ejected from the 'Bridge' in Dresden. On all this Pechstein is silent, and merely say that the size and the hectic life of Berlin had divided his life inexorably from those of former friends. Relations with Kirchner deteriorate too: many later misfortunes will result from the latter’s continuous slander.

Fig. 7) The catalogue of the Exhibition 'Max Pechstein auf Reisen : Utopie und Wirklichkeit"(Max Pechstein when travelling: utopia and reality), held at the Kusthaus of Stade between 2012 and 2013, at the Kunstsammlungen Zwickau in 2013 and the Kulturspeicher Würzburg in 2013. The catalogue was published by Hirmer and curated by Joachim Rees, Christoph Otterbeck, Aya Soika and Petra Lewey. On the front page, an image of Monterosso.

It's really a shame that almost nothing is told of the discussions on issues of aesthetics, not only among the painters of the 'Bridge' in Dresden in 1907-1912, but also with the 'Beasts' (Fauves) of Matisse in Paris (1908), with the 'Old' and 'New Secession' in Berlin (1911-1912) and with the 'Group of November', also in Berlin (1919). Pechstein was one of the few points of contact between French, Dutch and German expressionism, but on these aspects one can read a few lines only. On the relationship with Marc, Macke and Kandinsky in Munich he is spending only 7 words. Too little because a really interested reader would not get angry. 

In reality, Pechstein’s true friends are outside these groups and of their internal rivalries, and are especially those who have experienced the difficulties of life together with him, like the painter Alexander Gerbig, with whom he had the opportunity to share days of famine in Germany and days of happiness in Italy. 

Their friendship and their correspondence lasted forty years, and the Museum Pechstein of Zwickau dedicated an exhibition to their correspondence in these days. 

Other factors explaining the misfortune of the Memoirs 

The modesty of the contents of the Memoirs is probably not the only reason to be considered. Here are at least three more. 

The publishing history of the manuscript: During the Russian captivity and under the Polish occupation of Leba, Pechstein had risked being shot. After having barely survived, avoiding forgetfulness and loss of memory of the past, in the total uncertainty about the future, becomes a priority for him. Pechstein decides in a hurry to prepare a full text of autobiographical Memoirs. The text is dictated to a secretary in the turbulent years after the war, in 1945-1946. It is, however, most likely a still crude text, not ready (even from a linguistic point of view) for publication. We know from Fulda and Soika that the text was originally to be printed by the publisher Aufbau Verlag in the Soviet zone of Berlin (and therefore by a Socialist editor close to the Communist Party). The contract was signed in November 1945. In those months Soviet authorities were trying to lure communists and left-wing artists of the Weimar Republic in their orbit and many (e.g. Karl Hofer) responded. Fulda and Soika analysed the correspondence with the publisher Aufbau-Verlag. This is what most probably happened. At first it was the painter not to honour the deadline for delivery of the manuscript (December 1945). A first text was presented in October 1946. In September 1947, the publisher was ready to print, but the events (the introduction of the Deutschmark in West Germany in 1948) made the project impossible, which was therefore postponed. In October 1949, the project was completely cancelled by the communist authorities, because they considered it inappropriate from a political and aesthetic point of view.

It was the second wife to ensure that the manuscript prepared for dissemination in East Germany saw the light in West Germany, with the posthumous publication in 1960 in Wiesbaden, edited by Leopold Reidemeister. 

The critical isolation of Pechstein: immediately after the war, Pechstein tries to launch himself again as a central figure in the debate on modern German. He teaches since 1945 - thanks to Karl Hofer - at the School of Fine Arts of Berlin. From that chair, he multiplies the public positions taken on aesthetic issues, placing himself, such as Karl Hofer, among the opponents figurative abstraction, but he has no success. Christian Saehrendt has conducted a detailed archival research, from which results that 67 articles devoted to him are published by the German press between 1945 and 1950; the number is reduced to 57 in the decade between 1951 and 1960 and to only 9 between 1961 and 1970. On 3 January 1948, the new weekly Der Spiegel devotes an entire page to Pechstein (15), to offer him the opportunity to present himself to the German public opinion (after a few months, Der Spiegel will offer the same opportunity to Emil Nolde). In 1952 he was awarded the highest civilian honours from the Federal Republic of Germany, the Bundesverdienstkreuz. Since 1951 is an honorary member of the Senate of Berlin, and in 1954 he received the award on art of the city. However, these awards cannot hide his growing isolation. If Pechstein is included in almost all collective exhibitions on Expressionism, no personal retrospective was dedicated to him until 1959 (Berlin); the second is merely in 1987 (Wolfsburg). It is only since then that the painter is rediscovered, with solo exhibitions in Bremen (1988), Berlin (1996), Tübingen and Kiel (1997).

Fig. 8) The survey by Bernhard Fulda and Aya Soika
on Max Pechstein: The Rise and Fall of Expressionism, published by De Gruyter in 2012

Lack of financial support from a foundation: in a world like that of the German language, characterized by the geographical dispersion of the centres of culture, the memory of an artist also depends on the support it receives from local institutions of the State or city of origin. If you think for example to the publishing success of the diaries of Klee and Nolde, you cannot help but be reminded of the Klee Foundation, which operates in Bern since 1947, and the Foundation of Ada and Emil Nolde, active in Seebüll in Schleswig-Hollstein since 1957. It is the local foundation that holds high the banner of these painters, producing, either directly or indirectly, supporting studies, exhibitions, catalogues, and so on. The foundations are those bodies promoting both the success of the permanent local exhibitions and launch of international ones, thanks to the control of the copyright. They own archives and personal documents. In the case of Pechstein, this function belonged to the hometown of Zwickau and the adopted city of Dresden, which, however, were both under the Soviet communist regime. In a very early stage, something actually occurred: Christian Saehrendt explains that Pechstein in 1947 received the honorary citizenship of Zwickau and a prize to painting funded by the city was given his name. He even announced the intention of taking the actual residence there (he never did it, however). The following year, in 1948, he inaugurated the Moritzburg Museum (the town near Halle, where the 'Bridge' boys painted models nude in the woods and lakes, running the risk of running into some cop). As already explained, everything ended up very early, and Pechstein was forgotten even in Communist Germany. 

As often happens, centenaries may have a miraculous effect on memory, both in the West and in the East. Since 1981, there is a gradual awakening of interest. Also the new publication of the Memoirs of the publisher DVA Stuttgart in 1993 contributed to this. Three years later, in 1996, the largest personal retrospective exhibition of Pechstein was held in Berlin, at the Bridge Museum (Brücke-Museum). Camilla Blechen takes note on that occasion, in an article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (16), that historians have shown that much of criticism misfortune suffered by Pechstein was originated from the slander of his former colleagues in the 'Bridge', with a particular role negative by Kirchner. As in horror movies, then, the ghosts of the past may return. 

Much time has passed by now: Germany is today reunified, Pechstein has its own museum in Zwickau and perhaps the time has come for a first critical edition dedicated to the Memoirs. Surely, this is not a masterpiece, but you can read in a day only and you will really realise why the groups of young painters who met a hundred years ago were the true predecessors of the rock bands of our time. 

NOTES

(1) For general information on the Spartacus League, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spartacus_League

(2) Fulda, Bernhard / Soika, Aya - Max Pechstein: The Rise and Fall of Expressionism, Walter de Gruyter editore, 2012, 432 pages. 

(3) Monterosso, interestingly, was alternated ​​with another other seaside resort on the Baltic Sea, Nidden (then in German Courland, today’s Lithuania), so that Pechstein’s painting reflected, depending on where he was, the different nature and light of the North and the South. On the role which seaside centres of the Baltic Sea had for modern German art, see the exhibition at the Ascona Museum for Modern Art http://museoascona.ch/it/mcam/esposizioni/il-mar-baltico-delle-avanguardie.

(4) Saehrendt, Christian - "Die Brücke" zwischen Staatskunst und Verfemung, Franz Steiner editore, 2005, 124 pages

(5) Heymann, Walter - Max Pechstein, München, Piper, 1916, 78 pages and 30 illustrations. 

(6) Biermann Georg - Max Pechstein, Leipzig, Klinkhardt & Biermann 1919.

(7) See:
https://archive.org/stream/maxpechsteinmite00bieruoft/maxpechsteinmite00bieruoft_djvu.txt e http://books.google.de/books?id=6k0RAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA9&lpg=PA9&dq=diktiert+max+pechstein&source=bl&ots=3n7t1HzHt6&sig=pPINELQEhJDMwds19XpOi2_-kO8&hl=it&sa=X&ei=TrMYVIShGpLTaKfTgYgM&ved=0CEkQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=diktiert%20max%20pechstein&f=false

(8) Osborn, Max - Max Pechstein, Berlin, Propyläen-Verlag, 1922 

(9) See the article on Spiegel of 15 July 1953, http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-25656701.html

(10) Barron, Stephanie - Degenerate Art. The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany, New York, Harry N. Abrams, 1991, 434 pages. 

(11) Haftmann, Werner - Malerei im 20. Jahrhundert, Monaco di Baviera, Prestel Verlag, 1954 

(12) Haftmann, Werner – Verfemte Kunst. Malerei der inneren und äußeren Emigration, DuMont, 1984. 

(13) Lewey, Petra: Max Pechstein. Junge Kunst. Band 12, Klinkhardt and Biermann Verlag, München 2014. 

(14) Jähner,Horst: Künstlergruppe Brücke : Geschichte einer Gemeinschaft und das Lebenswerk ihrer Repräsentanten, Berlino Est, Henschelverlag, 1984. 

(15) See: http://magazin.spiegel.de/EpubDelivery/spiegel/pdf/44415383

(16) Camilla Blechen, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 02.12.1996, Nr. 281, S. 37 Herold einer neuen Weltsicht. Die Tor macht weit: Max Pechsteins malerisches Werk im Berliner "Brücke"-Museum.