Seated Girl (Franzi Fehrmann)

Lina Franziska Fehrmann was generally known as Fränzi and modelled for a large number of paintings related to the Die Brücke art movement which played an influential role in the overall rise of the German Expressionists.

She posed as an adolescent model on several occasions, as did several of her siblings. They were closely intwined in the work of this future-facing art movement which helped to draw attention to German art in the early 20th century. She first modelled at the age of 10 and continued into her early twenties. She remains somewhat of an engima in the movement, starring in several key paintings but also with relatively little known about her. She also appeared in some of Kirchner's photographs. An interesting comparison can be made between Seated Girl (Franzi Fehrmann) and a similar scene titled Franzi in Front of Carved Chair.

This artwork is now owned by the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, but check ahead if you are thinking of visiting, as many artworks can be loaned or rotated on display over time. It was completed in 1910, but later amended around a decade later. This venue also holds original artwork from other notable names such as Lucas Cranach the Elder, Sir Joshua Reynolds, El Greco, Jean Siméon Chardin, Édouard Manet, Frederic Leighton and Paul Gauguin to mention just a few.

You will see in both Seated Girl (Franzi Fehrmann) and Franzi in Front of Carved Chair that the model is depicted with bold red lips, alluring eyes and pretty clothes. Her sexuality was clear and underlined, though perhaps was too young to have been portrayed in this way. A quick comparison of the two paintings make it clearly the same model - the facial structure, even the colour scheme used by the artist is the same, with touches of green paint across her face. The pose does differ slightly in this painting, though, as she reclines on a bed or sofa.