Born in Hannover in 1896, Martel Schwichtenberg moved to Düsseldorf after graduation and trained at the private art school Kunowsky, then at the School of Applied Arts. In 1916, she moved to Hagen in Westphalia and remained there for a year. She spent the following summers in Worpswede.

In 1920, she installed a studio in Berlin-Charlottenburg. She joined the Werkbund and exhibited her work with the November Group. She gave herself the artist’s name ‘Martell’, which she changed to ‘Martel’ later. In 1921-22, she spent the summers with Karl Schmidt-Rottluff and other Expressionists in Koszalin.

In the late 1920s, she created especially luminous flower and fruit still lifes, as well as portraits of...