Berlin Secession
German artistic movement
The Berlin Secession was an art movement established in Germany on May 2, 1898. Formed in reaction to the Association of Berlin Artists, and the restrictions on contemporary art imposed by Kaiser Wilhelm II, 65 artists "seceded," demonstrating against the standards of academic or government-endorsed art. The movement is classified as a form of German Modernism, and came on the heels of several other secessions in Germany, including Jugendstil and the Munich Secession.
History
Rise and reign of the Secession
The upheavals that led to the formation of the Berlin Secession began in 1891 on the occasion of the Great International Art Exhibition in Berlin. A dispute began after the commission of the Association of Berlin Artists rejected images done by Edvard Munch. In May 1898, under the leadership of Walter Leistikow, Franz Skarbina and Max Liebermann, various artists converged to form a "free association for the organization of artistic exhibitions". This group was governed by a President, Max Liebermann, and a Secretary, Walter Leistikow, along with an executive committee. At the time of its inception, there was a total of 65 members, including both men and women as full members. All those involved in the Secession followed a constitution that defined terms of involvement in the group, and nothing could be changed without a three-fourths majority from the committee. The Free Union of the XXIV was founded in Munich and exhibited under this name in Berlin.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Berlin Secession” is german artistic movement. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Berlin, Secession and German, not as a finished interpretation.
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Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q700347. VIAF identifies the subject as 137539945. The Library of Congress control number is no2002009723. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1898 and 1891.
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This entry incorporates text from “Berlin Secession” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.