Beach Scene

1907

Exhibition for his 60th birthday at the Berlin Secession

The Secession staged a large exhibition in honour of its president's jubilee, and it was a great success; the honoree himself spent his 60th birthday in Noordwijk, hiding from his admiring public.

1908

The “Black-and-White Exhibition”: 59 of his etchings

From 1900 Liebermann devoted himself more and more to graphic art and pencil drawings; at the Secession's “Black-and-White Exhibition” of 1908, 59 of his etchings were shown.

1909–1910

The Wannsee villa — his “castle on the lake”

In 1909 Liebermann bought a plot on the shore of Lake Wannsee, where the architect Paul Otto August Baumgarten built a country house modelled on Hamburg patrician villas; he first moved in during the summer of 1910. The large garden, which he designed together with Alfred Lichtwark, dominated his painting for the rest of his life.

1910

The Secession board rejects 27 Expressionist paintings

The generational conflict between Impressionists and Expressionists came to a head when the board under Liebermann rejected 27 Expressionist canvases: the former rebel who had fought academicism now appeared a conservative spokesman. That same year the Secession showed Picasso, Matisse, Braque and the Fauves for the first time.

1910

The conflict with Nolde and the birth of the New Secession

Emil Nolde accused Liebermann of hostility to progress and of dictatorial power within the Secession; a general assembly voted 40 to 2 to expel Nolde, although Liebermann himself voted against the expulsion. The split could not be stopped: the New Secession was formed, and its first exhibition on 15 May was titled “Rejected by the Secession Berlin 1910”.