Two nude women, painted in vibrant coral peach and bubblegum pink, stand under a red umbrella in a landscape in this stylized, vertical painting. The scene is painted with areas of flat or streaked color with visible brushstrokes throughout. The women and umbrella take up most of the picture. The woman on our left stands facing our right almost in profile. Her skin is vivid peach. Slashes of red outline her breasts, groin, and legs. Her hair, eyes, and eyebrows are painted with black strokes. She stands on one leg and stretches the other in front of her to overlap the far foot of the other woman. The first woman hooks her arm through the elbow of the other, who stands facing us to our right. This second woman has vivid pink skin also outlined in red. Her face is a darker shade of pink, resembling a mask, and her eyes are parallel strokes of black and blue. Her left arm, on our right, hangs by her side, and she holds the umbrella with the other arm. She either wears a hat or her hair is painted with alternating bands of black, red, and brown, and there is a red flower or bow to one side. Black lines in the candy-red umbrella suggest a rib on the underside and the handle. Cobalt-blue branches of a tree above the women has blue and green leaves. The landscape beyond them is made up of bands of acid green, yellow, saturated blue, and cool green.
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Two Girls under an Umbrella, 1910, oil on canvas, Collection of Arnold and Joan Saltzman, 1992.58.1

Expressionism

German expressionists used art to respond to the cultural and political upheavals of the early 20th century. They were dissatisfied with social conventions and rejected academic standards of beauty. Instead, they embraced bold distortions; angular, simplified forms; and unnatural colors. 

  • This painting depicts four unclothed people in various poses within a lush, natural environment. The people have tan skin and shoulder-length dark hair. Two on the right appear to be women, but one on the left has their back to us, and another in the center is sitting on the ground, their knee raised and covering much of their torso. The people aren't drawn with clear facial features; instead, small dark dots show their eyes, with no detail beyond that. The background shows a dense forest or garden with green, brown, and hints of red brushstrokes indicating leaves, trees, and grass. In the background, a blue shape could indicate water nearby.
  • The painting features a collection of large, colorful flowers in varied shades of purple, pink, red, blue, orange, yellow, and white. Green stems and leaves surround the colorful flowers. In the top left corner, a person wearing a yellow hat is partially hidden among the foliage, facing the right and reaching towards the flowers. The paint is applied with thick, visible brushstrokes, and few small details are visible.
  • In this painting, abstract shapes and bright colors give the impression of two tall people standing outdoors. The people are in formal attire, depicted with vibrant colors and simplified forms: a man on the right has a square head with dark orange skin and no facial features. He appears to wear a black suit jacket over a white shirt with gray pants and a bowler hat. He stands next to another person on the left who appears to be a woman with dark red skin and no facial features wearing a blue coat over a white dress, with something on her head that may be a dark, wide-brimmed hat. The woman is reaching down to the left towards an area of the painting with white, pink, and orange shapes, which may depict a small child facing away from us, with white skin and clothes, light pink hair, and an orange hat. In the background, shapes resembling twisted brown and red tree trunks add organic lines, along with areas of green, orange, and yellow. Areas of blue suggest a sky behind the trees, and the ground under the people is mostly orange with areas of yellow, green, and blue.
  • This painting features three human faces with exaggerated, elongated profiles and simplified features. The person at the top of the image appears to be a woman with rosy cheeks wearing a black hat and large brown coat. In front of her are two men with black hair and curled, black moustaches, both wearing black jackets with white collars. The man in the very front appears to hold a thin sheet of white paper. The three people all have light skin in shades of peach, cream, and pale yellow. Between and around the people are geometric shapes in bright colors, including white angular shapes, green leaf-like shapes, and yellow diagonal shapes. The background contains red and yellow sections.
  • This is a painted portrait showing the upper body of a woman wearing a large hat or headdress. The woman is positioned facing slightly to the left. Her facial features are abstract and stylized, with dark, round eyes and thin red lips. Her skin is light green. Her dark hair is styled above her head, and on it rests an elaborate pink headdress full of flowers in shades of purple, pink, orange, yellow, and green. Her clothing is a mixture of dark orange and dark blue. The background is a mixture of blues and greens with streaks of red. The brushstrokes are textured and visible, and colors are layered over each other.
  • This painting shows a woman standing, facing left, her face turned away from us. She is nude, with pale skin the same color as the paper beneath, highlighted with areas of rosy pink and bright teal. She has auburn hair styled in a bun at the back of her head. The woman holds a colorful fabric with her right arm, patterned with areas of red, yellow, purple, white, and green.
  • This painting shows a landscape painted with vibrant bands of color. Trees and hills are depicted with bold, expressive brushstrokes of dark green, dark blue, bright red, and bright orange-yellow. The sky above is painted with a mix of dark and pale blues. Several people are depicted in the landscape, some standing and some kneeling or bending down. Their skin is painted in shades of red, yellow, and blue, and some appear to wear clothing while others seem to be nude. They have no visible facial features. The brushstrokes in the painting are thick and visible.
  • The sculpture depicts a person with their body bent forward, one leg extended down below them and the other stretched out backwards in the air, perpendicular to the ground. The person's arms are raised and bent at the elbows, with hands grasping a long, curved object near the back of their head. Their brow appears furrowed, their wide mouth in a neutral expression. The figure is dressed in a flowing garment that appears to be caught in mid-motion, its deep folds extending backwards. The sculpture has a rich brown color with a mottled surface, and the piece is supported on a slightly slanted rectangular base.
  • This is a painting of a colorful windmill. The tall windmill dominates the scene, positioned slightly to the right of center. Below is a horizontal strip of land painted in vertical and horizontal lines of green, yellow, blue, orange, purple, and white. The body of the windmill itself is painted in thick lines of white, yellow, and green, with blue shadows. The large blades of the windmill are suggested with lines of green, dark blue, and green, while the pointed roof is purple, black, and dark blue. The sky behind is a chaotic mix of shades of blue, including light blue, teal, blue-gray, and dark blue. Across the painting, the paint has been applied in thick, bold brushstrokes. Each brushstroke is visible, and different colors have been applied directly on top of one another, creating a swirling, fluid effect.
  • Two nude women, painted in vibrant coral peach and bubblegum pink, stand under a red umbrella in a landscape in this stylized, vertical painting. The scene is painted with areas of flat or streaked color with visible brushstrokes throughout. The women and umbrella take up most of the picture. The woman on our left stands facing our right almost in profile. Her skin is vivid peach. Slashes of red outline her breasts, groin, and legs. Her hair, eyes, and eyebrows are painted with black strokes. She stands on one leg and stretches the other in front of her to overlap the far foot of the other woman. The first woman hooks her arm through the elbow of the other, who stands facing us to our right. This second woman has vivid pink skin also outlined in red. Her face is a darker shade of pink, resembling a mask, and her eyes are parallel strokes of black and blue. Her left arm, on our right, hangs by her side, and she holds the umbrella with the other arm. She either wears a hat or her hair is painted with alternating bands of black, red, and brown, and there is a red flower or bow to one side. Black lines in the candy-red umbrella suggest a rib on the underside and the handle. Cobalt-blue branches of a tree above the women has blue and green leaves. The landscape beyond them is made up of bands of acid green, yellow, saturated blue, and cool green.
  • This painting presents a series of curved and bending lines intersecting with each other in an abstract pattern. The lines create a design resembling tree branches and leafy canopies. The background displays a mix of blue, yellow, and pink colors. At the base of the trees there are two red shapes that could be compared to small animals or creatures amidst the abstract landscape; one of them perches in a tree, while the other is on the ground, looking up.
  • The painting depicts birch trees and autumn foliage. The composition is filled with white-gray tree trunks and colorful leaves. The largest tree is to the right of center, beginning at the bottom of the painting and appearing to continue beyond the upper edge. The color palette includes deep oranges, reds, and yellows for the leaves, with some dark blues and greens suggesting shadows. The dark-blue sky is partially visible behind a tree on the left. The paint has been applied in thick, swirling strokes.

Explore more

Article:  What is German Expressionism? 8 Things to Know

This early 20th century art movement sought to convey the intensity of modern life.

You may also like

This square portrait shows the head and shoulders of a young woman in front of a spiky bush that fills much of the background except for a landscape view that extends into the deep distance to our right. The woman's body is angled to our right but her face turns to us. She has chalk-white, smooth skin with heavily lidded, light brown eyes, and her pale pink lips are closed. Pale blush highlights her cheeks, and she looks either at us or very slightly away from our eyes. Her brown hair is parted down the middle and pulled back, but tight, lively curls frame her face. Her hair turns gold where the light shines on it. She wears a brown dress, trimmed along the square neckline with gold. The front of the bodice is tied with a blue ribbon, and the lacing holes are also edged with gold. A sheer white veil covers her chest and is pinned at the center with a small gold ball. The bush fills the space around her head with copper-brown, spiky leaves. A river winds between trees and rolling hills in the distance to our right. Trees and a town along the horizon, which comes about halfway up the painting, is pale blue under an ice-blue sky.

Painting

Since ancient times, artists have made paintings to tell stories or capture beauty. They’ve used egg tempera, oil, and more recently acrylic to create compositions of all shapes and sizes. The results include radiant altarpieces, striking portraits, luminous landscapes, and abstract expressions.

A nude, pale-skinned woman sits facing away from us on a surface with bunches of blue and green-toned fabrics in this vertical painting. The woman’s right knee and torso angle away from us to the right, but she turns her head a bit to our left so we see the underside of her chin. Her brown hair is pulled up loosely into a high bun. Her right hand rests on fabric bunched on that leg, and her other hand disappears on the far side of lemon-lime green and celestial-blue pile of cloth near the lower left corner of the painting. The background is mostly golden yellow, perhaps a curtain, with some vertical pleats in moss green along the left side. The woman is lit from our right so the edges of her right arm, breast, torso, leg, and neck glow. The scene is loosely painted but has an overall soft, blended look. The artist signed and dated the painting in the top right corner, “Childe Hassam 1912.”

Human Body

The human form is often the foundation of academic artistic training—but accurately depicting anatomy is no easy feat. Many works show the artist’s admiration for the beauty of the human body. Others try to accurately capture a person in motion.