‘I know for my own part that I have no programme, only the inexplicable longing to grasp what I see and feel, and to find for it the purest expression.’ The words of German Expressionist Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, co-founder of the ‘Brücke’ movement in Dresden, convey the essence of the revolutionary movement in the arts which overthrew the stifling academicism of Kaiser Wilhelm’s Germany and led in the years between 1900 and 1914 to an amazing upsurge of creative activity.

The story of this decisive and immensely rich contribution to the history of twentieth-century art is told here largely in the vivid and intensely revealing words of the artists themselves.