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Picasso-Kirchner exhibition provides yet another key for understanding the multiple journeys, detours and caesuras in the evolution of several centuries of European art. Within this grand evolutionary trajectory, it becomes more fulfilling to appreciate why Picasso eventually became Picasso and Kirchner would become the artist he became.

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Tänzerin
Palucca, 1929, Privatsammlung. Foto:
Georgios Michaloudis, farbanalyse,
Köln

 

 

 

 

 

 

Picasso and Kirchner in Münster

Situated in the middle of the city of Münster, Germany, the magnificent and imposing LWL-Museum fur Kunst und Kultur proudly houses 1000 years of art spanning the Middle Ages to the present times.

With such an extensive and diverse collection of artistic treasures, it is rather tempting to digest the ongoing Picasso-Kirchner exhibition at the LWL-Museum against this impressive backdrop of numerous strands of European culture and history in order to understand the antecedents, work and impact of two indisputable masters of 20^th century art.

Münster is a beguiling city with a bustling center populated by restaurants, malls, shops and bakeries. The University of Münster is located in the vicinity and is accessible by foot or cycling. There are cyclists everywhere riding at considerable speed through a landscape dotted with parks, gardens and leafy trees. There are also historic monuments amid the trees and parks attesting to a city that has seemingly blossomed amid an intriguing swathe of politics, culture and art.

Interestingly, during the epoch of absolutism, the main religio-political figure was the prince-bishop who wielded secular and religious authority in the same breath. The nobility did all they could to exert their influence and some of the art produced in this era sought to capture and project this enormous sense of power and prestige. The nobility, in turn, emphasized the continuity of lineage and secular power as symbolized by the all-pervasive coat of arms, heirlooms, aristocratic adornments and other similar emblems of authority, prestige and longevity.

Specific professions entrenched the influence of the noble class notably, the military, the clergy, civic administration and land ownership. Indeed, the preoccupations of the Westphalian artisans and artists evolved alongside the growing prestige and influence of the nobility. Accordingly, artisans competed amongst themselves to create exquisite objets d’art made of cut glass, porcelain and silver casting to the decorate the elaborate dining halls of members of the highest echelons of society.

The wider society, in turn, adopted the aesthetic proclivities the nobility suggested to it. Admirably, the palace of Münster constructed in the 18^th century by Johann Conrad Schlaun, a Baroque architect, infused Gallic influences with classical Westphalian styles.

The middle classes were not spared these Gallic influences as they aspired to embrace the promises of the French Revolution- liberty, equality and fraternity. However, the middle classes experienced considerable push back from the upper classes and had to retreat to the comfort of their homes for existential succor, ornamental refinement, cultural sophistication, and creative fulfilment.

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Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Alpweg nach dem
Gewitter, 1923/24, LWL-Museum für Kunst und
Kultur. Foto: LWL / Sabine Ahlbrand-Dornseif

Consequently, the LWL-Museum is more than merely a veritable treasure trove of the larger cultural and artistic developments in Germany alone. Indeed, it embodies the deeper wellsprings of the European cultural spirit that make it possible to appreciate the current Picasso-Kirchner exhibition from different and more varied- both optic and socio-cultural- perspectives.

 

During the early stages of the 20^th century, Paris, the mercurial City of Lights, drew hordes of German artists. Paula Modersohn-Becker reportedly set foot on the famed city four times between 1900 and 1906. Max Pechstein endured the winter of 1907/08 in the same metropolis.

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Kaffeetafel (Vs),
1908, Erworben mit Unterstützung des
Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen, LWL-
Museum für Kunst und Kultur. Foto: LWL /
Sabine Ahlbrand-Dornseif

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Mandolinistin,
1921, Kirchner Museum Davos, Schenkung
Nachlass Ernst Ludwig Kirchner 1990. Foto:
Jakob Jägli

Ernest Ludwig Kirchner and Pablo Picasso were born a year apart. And both artists were immensely influenced French avant-garde art. Although Kirchner never visited Paris unlike Picasso who spent most of his life there, he was immensely inspired by the numerous creative trends, ruptures and innovations provided by modern French art. Kirchner was particularly impressed with the works of Paul Gauguin and Henri Matisse. He would eventually pass on in 1938 (Picasso died in 1973) but fortunately, was able to produce a powerful body of work.

Indeed, at the late 2025 exhibition, there is, arguably, a more impressive showing of his work than Picasso’s. Instructively, both artists never crossed paths personally and worked independently of each other. Nonetheless, as this exhibition demonstrates, there are more than a few parallels in their separate bodies of work.

Initially, when Picasso had moved from Spain to Paris in 1904, he lived modestly, trawling the underbelly and bohemian circles of the city and comingling with beggars and other social outcasts who provided much fuel for his feverish imagination.

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Zwei
Frauen auf der Straße (Vs.), 1914.
Foto: bpk, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-
Westfalen, Düsseldorf, Achim Kukulies
16_ Ernst Ludwig Kirchner,
Selbstporträt, nach 1935.
Foto: Kirchner Museum Davos

Kirchner, on the other hand, had re-located to Berlin in 1911 where he promptly embarked on the most productive phase of his artistic life. He found Berlin’s colorful night-life, jazz cafes and dance bars quite exhilarating and creatively liberating.  These fervid and informal urban encounters emboldened his remarkable creative vision. Arguably, there were several similarities between Paris and Berlin in the early 20^th century.

In 1932, Kirchner attended a major Picasso exhibition at the Kunsthaus Zurich which led him to employ some of the latter’s formal artistic innovations and experiments in form and style.

A Dresden art gallery had mounted an exhibition of Gauguin and some German artists, including Kirchner in 1910. Kirchner had also designed the exhibition poster using an image of Gauguin’s mother. The Kirchner designed feminine visage, proudly on exhibit at the LWL-Museum, bears unambiguous exotic features as he had mistakenly thought Gauguin’s mother was of Tahitian origin. His design also displays a convincing appreciation of techniques of modern marketing and advertising and the manner in which they frequently overlap with modern pop art.

Pablo Picasso, Figur mit gestreifter Bluse,
03.04.1949, Kunstmuseum Pablo Picasso Münster.
Foto: Kunstmuseum Pablo Picasso Münster / Hanna
Neander. © Succession Picasso / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2025

Pablo Picasso, Piano, 1920, Museum Berggruen –
Neue Nationalgalerie, Stiftung Preußischer
Kulturbesitz, Berlin. Foto: bpk / Nationalgalerie, SMB,
Museum Berggruen /Jens Ziehe. © Succession
Picasso / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2025

In comparing the works of Kirchner and Picasso on display, the former appears to make a more compelling statement. First of all, the LWL-Museum offers a more striking collection of Kirchner’s works. In addition, his paintings are bold, visually captivating and profoundly expressive. Picasso’s paintings, on the other hand, are uncharacteristically muted, or arguably guarded, in comparison. And as noted earlier, the themes and subject-matters of both artists are often similar when they do not directly overlap. Perhaps in somewhat minimizing Picasso’s largely often unquestioned brilliance and intimidating accomplishment, there is evident value and conceptual acuity in allowing a slightly less widely celebrated artist to breathe and gain well deserved prominence. This also speaks to a certain conceptual maneuverability and generosity on the part of the curators.

Pablo Picasso, Frau in Grün, 1909,
Eindhoven, Van Abbemuseum. Foto: Peter
Cox, Eindhoven. © Succession Picasso / VG
Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2025

Jointly, both artists present a lavish panorama of early 20^th century European art and urban lifestyles. But even more broadly, a deeper and more lasting impression is made if the Picasso-Kirchner exhibition is savored against the rich backdrop of the European artistic heritage housed at the LWL-Museum. Through this kind of conscious juxtaposition, the continuities and ruptures across the wider currents of European art spanning several centuries would be better appreciated. And indeed, the milestones attained in European art mirrored and were often entangled in the surrounding socio-political movements and upheavals that galvanized the entire continent.

My visit to the LWL-Museum enabled a splendid discovery of what are-for me- new names of European art and also a re-affirmation of the artistic worth of old icons. August Macke who was killed in 1914 created portraits, landscapes and still life’s in the expressionist mode that reflected his personal circumstances.

Ida Gerhardi, Melchior Lechter and Bernhard Pankok collectively re-imagined the natural world in a brilliantly visual way while at the same time embodying a Parisian sensibility regarding the illumined swirl of dazzling urbanscapes.

Also accommodated in the LWL-Museum are art works by the radical German artist Joseph (1921-1986). Beuys sought to democratize the art making process by making small-scale multiples in easy-to-handle forms, shapes and sizes and at affordable prices. Hans Arp and Max Ernst are also well represented attesting to their fifty-year-old relationship and creative development as major artists.

Such is the range and diversity of artists, traditions and centuries to be found within the remarkable interiors of the LWL-Museum.

Pablo Picasso, Frauenbildnis, 1941,
Solothurn, Kunstmuseum, Schenkung
Gerda und Peter Zeltner, 2012. Foto:
David Aebi, Bern. © Succession Picasso /
VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2025

Against this visually stunning background, the Picasso-Kirchner exhibition provides yet another key for understanding the multiple journeys, detours and caesuras in the evolution of several centuries of European art. Within this grand evolutionary trajectory, it becomes more fulfilling to appreciate why Picasso eventually became Picasso and Kirchner would become the artist he became. Some of the more obvious splendors of this exhibition, as such, not only lie in the productive staged conversations between Picasso and Kirchner, but even more broadly speaking, between their numerous peers and also their esteemed forebears who did so much to pave the way for great 20^th century art.

 

Sanya Osha, fellow, Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study, Stellenbosch, South Africa.

 

LWL-Museum für Kunst und Kultur, Münster
Until 18.1.2026

Kirchner Museum Davos
15.2. – 3.5.2026

Supported by the LWL-Kulturstiftung, the Stiftung Kunst³, the Stiftung der Sparkasse Münsterland Ost and the Ernst von Siemens Kunststiftung.