The Düsseldorf painter Fritz Reusing was one of the last important portrait painters of the Düsseldorf School. He was loved for his informal, powerful portraits in which he flawlessly captured the character of his subject. His oeuvre therefore includes portrait commissions from famous contemporaries, musicians (Strauss, Strawinsky), scientists (Einstein, Max Planck) and great industrialists such as Gustav Krupp and August Thyssen. The painter was educated at the academy in Düsseldorf, of which he became an honorary member in 1918. Already in 1901 he was a successful portraitist. In the following years he traveled to Paris, Holland and Belgium.