MUNTER, GABRIELE

born Feb. 19, 1877, Berlin, Ger. died May 19, 1962, Murnau, W.Ger. German painter closely affiliated with the abstractionist group Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider), although her emotive, colouristic works were influenced most strongly by the Postimpressionists and the Fauves. Mnter studied the piano throughout her youth but in 1902 entered the Phalanx School of art in Munich, where within a year she became the student and companion of Wassily Kandinsky. The two traveled widely, settling in Murnau in 1908. Mnter exhibited paintings at the Der Blaue Reiter exhibitions of 1911 and 1912. While sharing the group's characteristic intensity of colour and expressiveness of line derived in part from folk painting, her still lifes, figures, and landscapes remained uniquely representational. Notable works include Portrait of a Young Woman (1909) and Red Cloud (1911).