MAX OPPENHEIMER. Expressionist
Pioneer

Editor: Hans-Peter Wipplinger
Authors: Markus Böggemann, Alfred Fehringer, Kerstin Jesse, Lena Scholz, Lisa Smit, Aline Marion Steinwender, Hans-Peter Wipplinger

The extensive presentation illustrates not only the radicalism with which the Vienna-born painter and graphic artist kept transforming his style but also the substantial contribution he made to modern art. Featuring around 180 exhibits, the presentation Max Oppenheimer. Expressionist Pioneer sheds light on the artist’s largely unknown oeuvre and taps into the wealth of his motifs, ranging from portraits and religious themes, via still lifes to music depictions. The artist attracted attention early on, and exhibited his works all over Europe. While his successful career frequently took him abroad between 1912 and 1932, he invariably returned to Vienna. He became acquainted with numerous protagonists of Modernism, including Oskar Kokoschka, Egon Schiele, Paul Cassirer, Adolf Loos and Sigmund Freud, and explored trend-setting art movements, such as Cubism and Futurism. In 1938, Oppenheimer was forced to flee from the National Socialists via Switzerland to the US. In New York, where he died in 1954, he was unable to build on his former success.