Kurt Scheele

Kurt Scheele (* May 19, 1905 in Frankfurt am Main; † November 9, 1944 near Smolensk) was a German painter and wood engraver. His undestroyed oeuvre comprises around 330 woodcuts, 150 oil paintings, watercolors, gouaches, copper engravings, brush and pen drawings, as well as several literary works. Kurt Scheele achieved international recognition in the 1930s. In 1936, for example, Dwight D. Eisenhower purchased an oil painting by Kurt Scheele at an exhibition in New York. From 1937, Kurt Scheele’s paintings were considered “degenerate” in National Socialist Germany, so that Kurt Scheele fell into oblivion after the Second World War.