For Max Ackermann, a turning point began in the mid-1920s with his growing interest in sports, games, and the beach. Abstract themes and their realizations increasingly gained importance. In 1930, he founded a “Seminar for Absolute Painting” at the Stuttgart Adult Education Center. There, he taught in the spirit and tradition of Adolf Hölzel, developing the teaching of the laws of composition through theoretical studies and practical exercises.
In 1933, with the ban by the National Socialists, he retreated into “inner emigration” to the Höri Peninsula on Lake Constance. This retreat marked a new beginning. His encounter with Gertrud Ostermayer led to a turning point in his life, which culminated in a new creative period. From then on, human beings, nature, and landscapes merged in abstraction, combining the artist’s efforts toward realistic depiction and abstract dissolution. The drawings created in Horn can therefore be considered central works in Max Ackermann’s oeuvre.