MILLY STEGER (Rheinberg, Germany, 1881 - Berlin 1948). "Najade", 1934. Bronze. Signed with initials.

MILLY STEGER (Rheinberg, Germany, 1881 - Berlin 1948).
"Najade", 1934.
Bronze.
Signed with initials.
With foundry stamp.
Exhibitions: "European sculpture in the 20th century", European Museum of Modern Art (MEAM), Barcelona, 2014.
Size: 70 cm.
Milly Steger develops a language based on the investigation of volume, determined by defined forms and powerful lines that provide a precise vision of the piece. Her sculptures present a symbolism of a sober and elegant character. With regard to the technical and formal aspects, Steger demonstrates a great mastery of his craft, a virtuosity that is particularly evident in the details of the young woman's face, which is highly expressive, and the inner strength of the work.
After attending a boarding school in London, Milly Steger trained at art schools in Elberfeld. From 1903 to 1906, she received private training from Karl Janssen in Düsseldorf, as she could not enter the Düsseldorf Academy because she was a woman. She moved to Berlin in 1908, where she began teaching at the Women's Academy of the Berlin Society of Artists. Her sculpture was inspired by that of Georg Kolbe, Rodin, Maillol and Minne. She was involved in the circle of artists around Osthaus and established contacts with the sculptors Moissey Kogan and Will Lammert, the painter Christian Rohlfs and the glass painter Jan Thorn-Prikker. Steger lived in a house in the artists' colony "Am Stirnband" in Hohenhagen. For the tenth anniversary of the Folkwang Museum in Hagen in 1912, Milly Steger donated a sandstone woman's head above the museum's portal. With the support of Osthaus, she participated in exhibitions of the Sonderbund (1910 in Düsseldorf and 1912 in Cologne) and in the German Werkbund Exhibition in Cologne in 1914. His work was also part of the sculpture event in the art competition at the 1936 Summer Olympics. Noted avant-garde patron Katherine Dreier collected his work, but much of Steger's unsold oeuvre was lost when his studio was destroyed during World War II.