Nursing Mother, 1902

ArtistPaula Modersohn-Becker, Dresden 1876–1907 Worpswede

Oil on cardboard

(H x W)72,2 × 48 cm

Status

on display, room 018.2

About the workPaula Modersohn-Becker was ahead of her time. Around 1900, when making art was primarily reserved for men, she fought for the right to paint and exhibit. Women were also prohibited from officially studying art. After training in private academies in Berlin and Paris, Modersohn-Becker moved to the Worpswede artists’ colony near Bremen, where she captured an intimate moment between mother and child in this unusually direct depiction. Karl Koetschau, the Kunstpalast’s first director, acquired early this pivotal work in 1924. By 1935, however, many artists had been added to a National Socialist government blacklist and were later denounced as “degenerate”. Due to great political pressure, this painting was sold in 1937, but was reacquired in 2001.

AccessionAcquisition 1924, Sale 1937, Reacquisition 2001

ProvenanceAcquisition from Kunsthandlung Goyert, Cologne, 1924
Sale 1937
Reacquired from Galerie Haas, Berlin 2001 from the State of Northrine-Westphalia and the Cultural Foundation of the German Federal States and theBeauftragten der Bundesregierung für Angelegenheiten der Kultur und der Medien sowie des Ministeriums für Städtebau und Wohnen, Kultur und Sport des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen

Inventory number0.2001.3

Contact

sammlung@kunstpalast.de

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https://sammlung.kunstpalast.de/en/objects/41308/stillende-mutter

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