Max Bergmann was born in 1884 in Fürstenberg/Oder (today Eisenhüttenstadt). After graduating from high school, he studied painting in Berlin and Munich. He studied in Ludwig von Herterich’s nude painting class and in 1906 became a master student of the animal painter Heinrich von Zügel. Max Bergmann made several trips to other European countries. During a study visit to Paris in 1910, he met the painter Marcel Duchamp, who he visited in Munich two years later.
In 1912 Bergmann moved to Haimhausen. In 1914 he was married to Dorothea Karstadt. The marriage produced three children. The son Klaus also became a painter.
Bergmann was conscripted in the First World War. In 1916 he and his wife bought the Buttersack estate. In 1925 he opened a private painting school, with which he continued the tradition of Buttersack’s institution. The students blended in well with the village atmosphere and gave it its very own, charming character.
He spent many summers with his students in Wöhrt am Rhein, as he had done with his teacher Zügel. Wörth was a well-known painting village for open-air painters.
He regularly took part in exhibitions, including in the Haus der Kunst.
He died in 1955 and was buried in the cemetery in Ottershausen.
Max Bergmann was primarily known as an animal painter. His realistic depictions of animals have often been attributed to late Impressionism. Also worthy of note are his superb, but lesser-known, nudes, portraits, interiors, and landscapes.
The municipality of Haimhausen has named a street after Bergmann. Two animal paintings are owned by the Haimhauser Heimatmuseum.
