Lyonel Feininger

Lyonel Charles Feininger, 1871 – 1956, was a German-American painter, and a leading exponent of Expressionism. He also worked as a caricaturist and comic strip artist.

He was born and grew up in New York City, traveling to Germany at 16 to study and perfect his art. He started his career as a cartoonist in 1894 and met with much success in this area. He was also a commercial caricaturist for 20 years for magazines and newspapers in the USA and Germany. At the age of 36, he started to work as a fine artist. He also produced a large body of photographic works between 1928 and the mid 1950s, but he kept these primarily within his circle of friends. He was also a pianist and composer, with several piano compositions and fugues for organ extant.