Edward Munch is considered by most to be the first expressionist painters. In 1893 he painted The Scream which was his first dabbling in making this new generation of paintings. He was inspired by the work of other painters when making The Scream, most notably Vincent van Gogh. In this painting he wanted to show the anxiety of most people towards the modern society.

 

His style didn't catch on for a long time until in 1905 a group of German art students formed an organization named "Die Brucke". This group would make expressionist paintings borrowing heavily from Munch's style of painting as well as that of an Austrian painter named Gustav Klimt. Over the next ten to twenty years more of these expressionist groups would come into existence.

 

The art style started to catch on and was for the first time named "expressionism" in 1910 when at an art auction the salesman was asked whether the paintings he was auctioning were impressionist paintings, to which he simply said that this was a new style called expressionism. From there on out this slowly started to become the official name for the style.

 

In 1911 was the first art exhibition to feature many expressionist paintings, including those of Pablo Picasso. This exhibition was loved by critics and prompted for more people to try out expressionist painting.

 

After World War I expressionism started to heavily involve politics and political ideologies like socialism. Eventually around 1920 expressionism started to lose much of its popularity because many people weren't a fan of these new political paintings and felt they strayed too far away from what expressionism was all about.