Who was Otto Freundlich?
Otto Freundlich (1878–1943) was a German painter who became one of the early pioneers of abstract art in the twentieth century. He saw abstraction not just as a visual language but as a way to promote social equality and understanding. During the rise of the Nazi regime, Freundlich’s modern art was condemned as “degenerate” and removed from museums. As a Jewish artist living in France, he was later arrested during the Second World War and deported to the Sobibor concentration camp, where he was murdered in 1943.
