Ernst Ludwig Kirchner decorated his studio in Berlin with motifs copied from African, Indian, Indonesian, and Pacific Islander art. Kirchner’s fascination with non-European art was fueled by the founding of German colonies in the South Pacific and Africa in the late nineteenth century. The looting of art and artefacts from these colonies fed the collections at new ethnographic museums throughout Germany, where Kirchner and the other Expressionists encountered them removed from their original context. Still Life with Jug and African Bowl includes depictions of sculptures by Kirchner in the style of African woodcarving— similar to the sculpture displayed nearby, Dancer with Necklace.

Like other artists in this gallery, Kirchner was attacked as “degenerate” by the Nazis. Still Life, originally in the collection of Kunsthalle Mannheim, was confiscated in 1937 after the German Propaganda Ministry announced a “cleansing” of all public museums.

Wall label, 2021.