Paula Modersohn-Becker Museum

Opened in 1927 on Bottcherstrasse, the Paula Modersohn-Becker Museum was among the first museums in the world dedicated entirely to a single female artist, built as part of Ludwig Roselius's redevelopment of the street and designed by Bernhard Hoetger with an undulating brick facade that itself functions as a piece of Expressionist architecture. Inside, the collection concentrates on Modersohn-Becker's work from the Worpswede artists' colony near Bremen, where she developed a pared-back, proto-Expressionist style of portraiture and still life in the years before her early death in 1907 at age 31, shortly after giving birth to her daughter. The museum holds one of the largest collections of her paintings and works on paper, hung across several intimate, low-ceilinged rooms connected by narrow stairways that are themselves part of the original 1920s design. A visit takes 45 minutes to an hour, quick relative to larger museums, given the collection's focused scope. Weekday mornings shortly after opening offer the smallest crowds, since the museum sits directly on the busy Bottcherstrasse tourist route and can see a steady flow of visitors through midday. A combined ticket with the adjoining Ludwig Roselius Museum covers both collections for one admission price.