They [his 'Street Scene' paintings and drawings,he made in Berlin] originated in the years 1911-14, in one of the loneliest times of my life, during … - Ernst Ludwig Kirchner

Life is unfixed when one lives in Berlin, where one has to fight for a living. It is painfully base here. I see that a fine, free culture cannot be created under these circumstances and wish to leave as soon as I have overcome this big slump.

German original version: (schön wäre es, wenn Sie mich nicht Expressionisten nennen würden. Ich bin wirklich keiner.]

..and the first thing for he artists [of Die Brücke ] was free drawing from the free human figure in the freedom of nature.. .We drew and we painted. Hundreds of paintings a day, with talk and fooling in between, the artists joining the models before the easel and vice versa. All the encounters of everyday life were incorporated in our memories in this way. The studio became the home of the people who were being drawn; they learned from the artists and the painters from them. The picture [ made] took on immediate and abundant life.