Otto Mueller was born in Liebau, Silesia (now Poland). He began his training at age sixteen in a four-year apprenticeship to a lithographer in Gorlitz. In 1894 he enrolled at the Academy of Art in Dresden, where he studied for two years. Mueller remained near Dresden until 1908, but did not meet any of the artists affiliated with Die Brucke* until 1910, two years after his move to Berlin. It was then, after having his work rejected for inclusion in the Berlin Secession* exhibition, that he joined Emil Nolde and Max Pechstein in founding the Neue Secession. These artists, along with other members of the Brucke, exhibited their work in an alternative exhibition, "Rejects of the Berlin Secession." Mueller's images of nudes in nature, for which he is best known, caught the attention of the Brucke artists. He was invited to join the group, and he remained affiliated until its dissolution in 1913.

Mueller served in the military for one year during World War I and was hospitalized briefly in 1917. Unlike that of other Brucke artists, his imagery seems not to have been affected by his wartime experience; his post-war work differs little from that made before the war.

In 1919 Mueller began teaching at the Breslau Academy and continued there until his death. He traveled extensively in Eastern Europe during the 1920s and his art of the period reflects his fascination with the region's gypsy culture. Mueller's interest in printmaking was primarily in lithography*. Of his total oeuvre* of 149 prints, he made only 6 woodcuts and 1 etching. The rest were lithographs." (Excerpt from The Print in Germany. By Frances Carey and Antony Griffiths)

Source:
http://www.germanexpressionism.com/printgallery/mueller/index.html

* For more in-depth information about these terms and others, see AskART.com Glossary http://www.askart.com/AskART/lists/Art_Definition.aspx

Draft for a wall figure frieze in Otto Mueller's apartment in Berlin-Friedenau, Wilhelmshöherstr. 18 In April 1917 Otto Mueller fell ill with pneumonia and contracted tuberculosis. For this reason he was moved to the reserve hospital in the former Camillian monastery in Neuss. During this time, from April 17th to June 15th, he organized his participation in the Great Berlin Art Exhibition in Düsseldorf and produced the present work. The frieze is a reminiscence of the stays of Otto and Maschka Mueller in the summer of 1910/1911 with Erich Heckel, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and Max Pechstein at the Moritzburg ponds to study nudes together outdoors.

Fränzi Fehrmann, whom Kirchner immortalized in many works, also took part in these meetings. These variations of bathers at the Moritzburg ponds can also be found in a similar arrangement on the paintings from the years 1910-1916. In addition to the present work, Otto Mueller made other figure friezes with files that he kept in his apartment in Berlin-Friedenau and later in Berlin-Schöneberg exhibits. There are also photos in the archive of the Otto Mueller Society. Pirsig-Marshall / von Lüttichau 2020 P 1917/14.