Alongside Matisse and Picasso, German artist Paula Modersohn-Becker boldly introduced the world to modernism at the turn of the 20th century. 

Comprising around 100 paintings and drawings, Louisiana is organising the first major exhibition of her work in Scandinavia. 

In a remarkably short career, cut tragically short at the age of 31, Modersohn-Becker went on to rock the art establishment with groundbreaking paintings renowned for their intensity and extravagant use of colour. 

Thanks to her acclaimed writing, her expressionist pieces took off in Germany in the 1920s. A number of her works were even featured in the famous Nazi exhibition Entartete Kunst in 1937.

Drawing significantly from Gauguin and Cézanne, whom she studied in Paris, Modersohn-Becker’s landscapes have an archaic glow, while her figure paintings – particularly of mother and child – capture solemn expressions that challenged traditional styles of the female body at the time.  

Acknowledged as one of the first female painters to produce female nudes, she firmly cemented a name for herself in art circles dominated by men. 

Today, she is regarded as a radical innovator of modernism and as one of Germany’s most beloved artists. 

While her career was brief, Louisiana’s comprehensive exhibition will open a window into the exceptional world of this creative revolutionary.

opens Dec 15; Louisiana, Gammel Strandvej 13, Humlebæk; louisiana.dk