Gabriele Münter

Gabriele Münter’s wealthy parents encouraged her artistic talent early on. From 1897 she attended Willy Spatz’s ladies’ art school in Düsseldorf. After her parents’ death, Münter went to America for two years and finally moved to Munich. Here she attends the art school “Phalanx”, where Wassily Kandinsky also teaches. In 1903 she became engaged to the married man. Between 1904 and 1908 they travelled together to Tunisia, the Netherlands, Italy and France. In August 1909 Münter bought a house in Murnau, which quickly became a popular meeting place for young painters and is now open to the public under the name “Münter-House”. In the same year Münter became a co-founder of the New Munich Artists’ Association. The first exhibition takes place in 1911 together with Marc and Kandinsky, among others. Münter’s expressive language now changes from the Impressionist manner influenced by the Fauvists to Expressionist expressiveness. In 1911 Münter, Kandinsky, Marc and Kubin leave the New Munich Artists Association and found the Blaue Reiter (Blue Rider). After the outbreak of the First World War, the painter goes to Switzerland with Kandinsky in 1914, as he is no longer allowed to stay in Germany. From 1915 to 1920 she lives in Scandinavia without Kandinsky, who has now settled in Moscow. After Kandinsky marries his second wife Nina in February 1917, he refuses all contact with Münter, which offends her greatly. After their final separation, Münter lives alternately in Cologne, Munich and Murnau. Depression temporarily keeps her from painting. In 1925 Münter moves to Berlin. In 1931 she settles permanently in Murnau with her new partner, Johannes Eichner. An exhibition ban by the National Socialists also forces her to retreat into private life in 1937. In 1949 Münter is represented with nine works in the exhibition of the “Blaue Reiter” at the Haus der Kunst in Munich. From 1950 a complete exhibition of her work is shown in numerous German museums. In 1955 she is a participant in documenta 1 in Kassel. Münter is also a member of the German Artists’ Association, in whose annual exhibitions she participates in 1952 and 1960. In 1957 she donated her art collection, numerous works of her own, more than 80 paintings by Kandinsky and works by other members of the Blaue Reiter to the city of Munich, making the Munich Municipal Gallery in the Lenbachhaus world-famous at a stroke. Gabriele Münter dies in Murnau on 19 May 1962. In recent decades, Münter’s work has been celebrated with further exhibitions such as a retrospective (1992) and in 2017 with the exhibition “Gabrielle Münter. Painting without Circumlocution”. In addition, the Gabriele Münter and Johannes Eichner Foundation is currently compiling a catalogue raisonné of the paintings. The updated catalogue of prints was published in 2000.