Christa von Schnitzler

Christa von Schnitzler in her studio in 1979. Photography by Mara Eggert

The sculptor Christa von Schnitzler (12.07.1922 in Cologne - 28.06.2003 in Frankfurt am Main) was already modeling heads as a child. Her father was a banker. After going bankrupt, the family lived in Italy, France and the Netherlands, where they met Beckmann in the early 1940s. From Portugal, the Schnitzler family returned to Germany, where the family owned Gut Giersberg in Bad Münstereifel. Christa von Schnitzler spent her school years at the "Birkle-Schule" boarding school in the Black Forest. She studied with Toni Stadler at the Städel in Frankfurt am Main from 1942 to 1947 and went with him to the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich from 1947 to 1952, where she met Michael Croissant and married him in 1953. She returned to Frankfurt in 1966, moved into an apartment in Sachsenhausen in Schwanthaler Strasse and a studio in Textorstrasse 93. In February 1984 she met Gisela Nietmann and worked with her for 19 years in a close studio community.