Else Berg artwork • watercolour • drawing • previously for sale Fruit bowl and can on a table

The Upper Silesia-born painter Else Berg was one of the first in the Netherlands to be drawn to the sober forms and vivid colour use of the German Expressionists. In a robustly composed language she painted landscapes, figures and still lifes. After she moved with her husband, Mommie Schwarz, to Bergen in 1915, her palette became more sombre, even though the vivid pinks, yellows and blues still recall German Expressionism. The rhythmic, fanning out of her brushstrokes refer to the influence of theosophy, with which she came into contact via her friend Charley Toorop.