A twentieth-century artist
Christian Schad (1894–1982) is one of the most important protagonists of Modernism. His life is closely bound up with the European cities of Zurich, Geneva, Rome, Vienna, and Berlin and reflects in an exemplary way the art movements of the twentieth century: from Dada, Expressionism, and New Objectivity up to Magical Realism after 1945.
Next to his “icons” of New Objectivity, his world fame was based on the camera-less photograph, or Schadograph. The Christian Schad Museum introduces the figure of the artist and his work in the context of social developments.
In 1942 Christian Schad arrived in Aschaffenburg for lucrative public and private commissions. When his Berlin studio was destroyed in aerial bombing, his future wife Bettina saved the artworks in a spectacular action and brought them to him. An initially provisional arrangement turned into a stay of four decades.