Marlies Meinshausen-Felsing

(1899 - 1973) 

Marlies Meinshausen-Felsing is one of my most loved printmaking artists. Her garden gave her life time inspiration to enjoy, sketch, design cut and print some 60 different prints (I discovered, encountered and catalogued so far). As a young women she musty have met all the important and a generation older printmakers visiting her illustrious fathers Berlin “Drückerei”. Among them for example Meta Cohn-Hendel, one of the greatest flower printmakers.   

Most of them were acquired and collected if the budget allowed. There are a handful that will be placed and found in the Collections Wishlist. Although the collecting criterium never has been to collect “all prints available” (based on greed)  but to represent as many women printmakers by selected and as fine examples the budget allows. With a few artists however a point of no return has been reached.  Marlies Meinshausen finds herself in the company of Marianne von Buddenbrock and Else von Schmiedeberg-Blume also noted for their flower prints. 

Mrs Meinshausen loved to combine and arrange  the ordinary field and garden flowers into simple but also elaborate compositions. For these large compositions she would need many, sometimes 15 or more, blocks to print all required colours and sahdes. Her prints are sometimes mistaken for monotypes, the only proof that they are actually printed in editions is by comparing different copies.