Friedrich Wilhelm Otto Modersohn was a German landscape painter. He was associated with the Düsseldorf school* of painting and a member of the artists colony in Worpswede.

In 1884 his family moved from Soest to Münster. During his time at secondary school Otto Modersohn developed a keen interest in art. After graduating from secondary school, he Modersohn went to the Düsseldorf Academy*, but he did not agree with the teaching methods used there. After a short sojourn in Munich, he hoped to find artistic role inspiration at the Karlsruhe Academy, but once again he was disappointed.

A trip through northern Germany with Fritz Mackensen in 1888 on the other hand inspired Otto Modersohn to a series of smaller pictures. These became a highlight of his early years. A further trip in 1889 of the two artists to Worpswede* art colony, a small town northeast of Bremen led to the joint decision to move to the artists' colony for good. However, after initially sharing the same ideas, Otto Modersohn gradually began to move away from his friends. He wrote: "Quiet, quiet greatness is really my actual goal," and he would rather "say much by saying little[...]."

In 1895 eight of Modersohn's works were entered in the joint exhibition of the Worpsweder art colony at the Bremen "Kunsthalle". The reactions to this exhibition were varied, but the subsequent contribution to the "Internationale Glaspalastausstellung" in Munich was particularly successful for Modersohn.

In 1897 Paula Becker visited Worpswede for the first time, and in 1901 Otto Modersohn and Paula Becker married. Meanwhile Otto Modersohn was thinking more and more about leaving the colony. The time that followed was determined by numerous travels with his wife and various sojourns in Germany and France. In spring 1907 Modersohn finally returned to Worpswede. Paula Modersohn died there in November of the same year after the birth of their daughter.

Otto Modersohn then moved to Fischerhude, where 1908 marked the beginning of "a new era" for him. In this rural environment, he studied nature and after renewed sojourns in Worpswede and Berlin he returned to Fischerhude in 1917.

"Simplification, summarization in form and color is a main aim" of his artwork during the 1920s. Hence Modersohn found important inspiration in Holland and the southern German region of Allgäu, where he bought a house in 1930.

In 1936, he turned blind on one eye. Subsequently, he stopped visiting the Allgäu and continued only to paint in his studio in Fischerhude.

In 1943, Otto Modersohn died after a short, unexpected illness.

Source:
"Otto Modersohn", art directory, http://www.otto-modersohn.com/ (Accessed 4/29/2013)

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Otto Modersohn first studied with Eugene Dückers at the Art Academy in Düsseldorf. In 1888 he moved to Karlsruhe, where Hermann Baisch was his teacher. Looking for the simplicity and intimacy of nature Modersohn visited with his fellow painter Fritz Mackensen for the first time the Lower Saxony village of Worpswede in 1889. Thus he laid the foundation for the artists' colony, to which other painters followed.

In 1895, the artists successfully exhibited for the first time as a group in Bremen and Munich. In 1899 Modersohn left the group, because he felt restricted in his personal liberty. After the death of his second wife, the painter Paula Becker, he moved to Fischerhude, where he lived until his death.

Modersohn's oeuvre is marked by the artist’s inward feeling for nature while focusing on simplicity, rejecting pathos and academicism. The Otto Modersohn Museum in Fischerhude was established in 1974 and expanded in 2011.