Culture
Famous Artists from Germany
List of the most popular artists from Germany, listed alphabetically with photos when available. Be sure to also check out weird quirks of history's greatest artists and famous surrealist artists. For centuries artists have been among the world's most important people, helping chronicle history and keeping us entertained with one of the earliest forms of entertainment. Whether they're known for painting, sculpting, etching or drawing, the famous German artists on this list have kept that tradition alive by creating renowned pieces of art that have been praised around the world. You can find useful information below about these notable German artists, such as when they were born and where their place of birth was.
This list below has everything from Paul Klee to Hans Bellmer. Whether you're looking for great German painters, contemporary artists, or sculptors, you'll surely find the most renown below.
This list answers the questions, "Which famous artists are from Germany?" and "Who are the most well-known German artists?"
For further information on these historic German artists, click on their names. If you're a fine art lover use this list of celebrated German artists to discover some new paintings that you will enjoy.
- Angelus Novus, Revolution des Viadukts, Der Goldfisch
- Birthplace: Münchenbuchsee, Switzerland
- Associated periods or movements: German Expressionism, Der Blaue Reiter, Cubism, Surrealism, Expressionism
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting, Drawing
Paul Klee (German: [paʊ̯l ˈkleː]; 18 December 1879 – 29 June 1940) was a Swiss-born artist. His highly individual style was influenced by movements in art that included Expressionism, Cubism, and ...more - The Machine Gun(neress) in a State of Grace, La Poupee, The Doll
- Birthplace: Katowice, Poland
- Associated periods or movements: Dada, Surrealism
- Nationality: France, Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Hans Bellmer (13 March 1902 – 24 February 1975) was a German artist, best known for the life-sized pubescent female dolls he produced in the mid-1930s. Historians of art and photography also consider ...more - Two Japanese Wrestlers by a Sink, Woman with a Daffodil, Girl with a White Dog
- Birthplace: Berlin, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Contemporary art, Realism, Realism, Surrealism, Expressionism
- Nationality: United Kingdom
- Art Forms: Painting
Lucian Michael Freud, OM (; 8 December 1922 – 20 July 2011) was a British painter and draftsman, specializing in figurative art, and is known as one of the foremost 20th-century portraitists. He was ...more - Longeuil, Normandie, Spook I
- Birthplace: New York City, New York
- Associated periods or movements: German Expressionism, Der Blaue Reiter, Die Brücke, Cubism, Expressionism
- Nationality: United States of America, Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Lyonel Charles Feininger (July 17, 1871 – January 13, 1956) was a German-American painter, and a leading exponent of Expressionism. He also worked as a caricaturist and comic strip artist. He was ...more - Lightning with Stag in its Glare, The End of the Twentieth Century, 7000 Oaks
- Birthplace: Krefeld, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Fluxus, Conceptual art
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Performance, Sculpture
Joseph Beuys ( BOYSS, German: [ˈjoːzɛf ˈbɔʏs]; 12 May 1921 – 23 January 1986) was a German Fluxus, happening, and performance artist as well as a painter, sculptor, medallist, installation artist, ...more - Moonrise Over the Sea, Wreck in the Ice-sea, Wanderer above the Sea of Fog
- Birthplace: Greifswald, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Romanticism, German Romanticism
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Caspar David Friedrich (5 September 1774 – 7 May 1840) was a 19th-century German Romantic landscape painter, generally considered the most important German artist of his generation. He is best known ...more - The Elephant Celebes, Napoleon in the Wilderness, Aquis Submersus
- Birthplace: Brühl, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Dada, Surrealism
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Sculpture, Painting
Max Ernst (2 April 1891 – 1 April 1976) was a German (naturalised American in 1948 and French in 1958) painter, sculptor, graphic artist, and poet. A prolific artist, Ernst was a primary pioneer of ...more - Christ among the Doctors, Altarpiece of Ober-St. Veit, Lamentation for Christ
- Birthplace: Nuremberg, Germany
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting, Printmaking, Drawing
Albrecht Dürer (; German: [ˈʔalbʁɛçt ˈdyːʁɐ]; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528) sometimes spelt in English as Durer or Duerer, without umlaut, was a painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German ...more - T1974- E10, T 1966–H36, T1989-A1 38-0
- Birthplace: Leipzig, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Lyrical abstraction
- Nationality: France, Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Hans Hartung (21 September 1904 – 7 December 1989) was a German-French painter, known for his gestural abstract style. He was also a decorated World War II veteran of the French Foreign Legion. - Improvisation, November in New Mexico
- Birthplace: Paris, France
- Associated periods or movements: Cubism, American modernism
- Nationality: France, United States of America, Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Andrew Michael Dasburg (4 May 1887 – 13 August 1979) was an American modernist painter and "one of America's leading early exponents of cubism". - Lago Maggiore, Casa Bodmer, Piktors Verwandlungen
- Birthplace: Calw, Germany
- Nationality: Switzerland, Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Hermann Karl Hesse (German: [ˈhɛɐ̯man ˈhɛsə]; July 2, 1877 – August 9, 1962) was a German-born poet, novelist, and painter. His best-known works include Demian, Steppenwolf, Siddhartha, and The Glass ...more - Portrait of Henry VIII, Noli me Tangere, Portrait of Robert Cheseman
- Birthplace: Augsburg, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Northern Renaissance
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Hans Holbein the Younger (UK: HOL-byne, US: HOHL-byne, HAWL-; German: Hans Holbein der Jüngere; c. 1497 – between 7 October and 29 November 1543) was a German painter and printmaker who worked in a ...more - City Horizon, Fruit Bowl with Apples, Table--Version II
- Birthplace: Weißenburg in Bayern, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Abstract expressionism
- Nationality: United States of America, Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Hans Hofmann (March 21, 1880 – February 17, 1966) was a German-born American painter, renowned as an artist and teacher in a career that spanned two generations and two continents, and is considered ...more - Rest of the Virgin during The Flight into Egypt, The Golden Age, A Princess of Saxony
- Birthplace: Kronach, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: German Renaissance
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Lucas Cranach the Elder (German: Lucas Cranach der Ältere German pronunciation: [ˈluːkas ˈkʁaːnax dɛɐ̯ ˈʔɛltəʁə], c. 1472 – 16 October 1553) was a German Renaissance painter and printmaker in woodcut ...more - Sebastian (or Sébastien) Stoskopff (July 13, 1597 – February 10, 1657) was an Alsatian painter. He is considered one of the most important German still life painters of his time. His works, which ...more
- Master M. S. (Hungarian: M. S. Mester, German: Meister M. S., Slovak: Majster M. S.) was a 16th-century painter in Central Europe in late Gothic and early Renaissance art. He was active in Banská ...more
- The Small Cruxifixion, The Mocking of Christ, Stuppach Madonna
- Birthplace: Würzburg, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: Renaissance
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Matthias Grünewald (c. 1470 – 31 August 1528) was a German Renaissance painter of religious works who ignored Renaissance classicism to continue the style of late medieval Central European art into ...more - Last Supper
- Birthplace: Wittenberg, Germany
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Lucas Cranach the Younger (Lucas Cranach der Jüngere [jʏˈŋɛʁə]; 4 October 1515 – 25 January 1586) was a German Renaissance painter and portraitist, the son of Lucas Cranach the Elder. - Stefan Jäger (May 28, 1877 in Tschene/Torontál – March 16, 1962 in Jimbolia/Hatzfeld, Romanian Banat) was a painter known for his depiction of and deep identification with the Danube Swabian ...more
- Basilica of St. Mary, Basilica of St. Paul, St. Catherine Altar
- Birthplace: Augsburg, Germany
- Associated periods or movements: International Gothic
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting
Hans Holbein the Elder (UK: HOL-byne, US: HOHL-byne, HAWL-; German: Hans Holbein der Ältere; c. 1460 – 1524) was a German painter. - Dürer's Rhinoceros, Knight, Death and the Devil
- Birthplace: Schwäbisch Gmünd, Germany
- Nationality: Germany
- Art Forms: Painting, Printmaking
Hans Baldung Grien or Grün (c. 1484 – September 1545) was a German artist in painting and printmaking who was considered the most gifted student of Albrecht Dürer. Throughout his lifetime, Baldung ...more - Jacob Marrel (1613/1614 – 11 November 1681) was a German still life painter active in Utrecht during the Dutch Golden Age.
- Sternkarten (Star Map), from Photographische Sternkarten ...
- Birthplace: Heidelberg, Germany
- Nationality: Germany
Maximilian Franz Joseph Cornelius Wolf (21 June 1863 – 3 October 1932) was a German astronomer and a pioneer in the field of astrophotography. He was chairman of astronomy at the University of ...more - Jan Boeckhorst or Johann Bockhorst (c. 1604 – 21 April 1668), was a German-born Flemish Baroque painter and draughtsman. He was a versatile artist who produced history paintings, genre scenes and ...more
- Georg Flegel (1566 Olomouc – 23 March 1638, Frankfurt-am-Main) was a German painter, best known for his still life works.
