26 Facts About Rudolf Schlichter

Rudolf Schlichter was a German painter, engraver and writer.

Rudolf Schlichter was one of the most important representatives of the critical-realistic style of verism within the New Objectivity movement.

Rudolf Schlichter lost his father early, and grew up as the youngest of six siblings.

Rudolf Schlichter's mother, who worked as a seamstress, was a Protestant, while his father, a professional gardener, was a Catholic.

Rudolf Schlichter attended the Latin school in Calw until the sixth grade.

Rudolf Schlichter started in 1904 an apprenticeship as an enamel painter at a Pforzheim factory.

Rudolf Schlichter subsequently studied at the Academy of Fine Arts, in Karlsruhe, under Hans Thoma and Wilhelm Trubner, among others, from 1910 to 1916.

Already during his studies, Schlichter developed into an artist who saw himself related to contemporary bohemian ideals and in rebellion against traditional bourgeois values.

Rudolf Schlichter undertook various study trips to Strasbourg, in Alsace, to Italy and France, and got contacts to the underworld through fellow painter Julius Kaspar.

Rudolf Schlichter visited Berlin for the first time around 1910, where his brother Max Schlichter was head chef at the renowned Hotel Kaiserhof.

Rudolf Schlichter had a first exhibition in 1919 in the Iwan Moos Gallery, in Karlsruhe.

In 1919, Rudolf Schlichter moved to Berlin, where he joined the November Group, the Berlin Secession, the Berlin Dadaists and became politically active.

Politically, Rudolf Schlichter was involved in left-wing organizations and in the communist party KPD, of which he was a member from 1919 to 1927.

In 1925, Rudolf Schlichter's works were on view in the Neue Sachlichkeit exhibition in Mannheim, initiated by Gustav Friedrich Hartlaub, the director of the Kunsthalle Mannheim.

In 1927, Rudolf Schlichter met his future wife, Elfriede Elisabeth Rudolf Schlichter, known as "Speedy", who, because of her appearance and demeanor in Berlin artistic circles, had the reputation of being a "living lady".

Rudolf Schlichter's wife was represented by Schlichter in countless drawings, sketches, watercolors and paintings.

Rudolf Schlichter expanded his circle of acquaintances to include the authors Arnolt Bronnen, Ernst von Salomon and the politician Ernst Niekisch.

In 1932 the Rudolf Schlichter couple moved back to the artist's Swabian homeland and settled in Rottenburg.

At first, Rudolf Schlichter believed he could take part in the "national revolution" of the Nazis by drafting a religious-national concept of art.

In Rottenburg, Rudolf Schlichter maintained good relations with Roman Catholic Bishop Joannes Baptista Sproll, an outspoken opponent of the Nazis, whom he portrayed.

At the beginning of 1938 Rudolf Schlichter was temporarily removed from the Reich Chamber of Fine Arts, expelled, banned from exhibiting, and was shortly thereafter, denounced because of his "non-National Socialist lifestyle".

Rudolf Schlichter's studio was destroyed by Allied bombs in 1942, and he lost some of his works.

Rudolf Schlichter died of uremia and was buried in the Munich forest cemetery.

Rudolf Schlichter created fantastical allegories and historical paintings influenced by surrealism during and especially after the World War II.

Rudolf Schlichter wrote several confessional writings, some with autobiographical references and erotic themes.

Rudolf Schlichter published Zwischenwelten, which was his first attempt to process his erotic mania and was described by the publisher as "the passionate confession of an erotically devious nature".