Alexander Kanoldt was born September 29, 1881 and died on January 24, 1939 at the age of 60. He was a German magic realist painter and one of the first artists of the New Objectivity era. Kanoldt was born in Karlsruhe. His father was the painter Edmond Kanoldt, a late practitioner of the Nazarene style. After studies at the Academy of Fine Arts Karlsruhe in Karlsruhe he went to Munich in 1908, where he met a number of modernists such as Alexei Jawlensky, Wassily Kandinsky and Gabriele Münter. He became a member of the Munich New Secession in 1913, with Jawlensky and Paul Klee. After military service in World War I from 1914 to 1918, the still lifes Kanoldt painted show the influence of Derain and an adaptation of cubist ideas.

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By the early 1920s, Kanoldt developed the manner for which he is best known, a magic realist rendering of potted plants, angular tins, fruit and mugs on tabletops. He also painted portraits in the same severe style, as well as geometrical landscapes. In 1925, he was made a professor at Breslau Academy, a post he held until 1931. During this time he came into conflict with the Bauhaus faction at the Academy, and he was increasingly at odds with the avant garde. From 1933 until his resignation in 1936, he was the director of the State School of Art in Berlin. And with the rise of the Nazi regime in 1933, Kanoldt attempted accommodation, painting in a romantic style, but nonetheless many of his works were seized by the authorities as degenerate art in 1937.

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Kanoldt's ideas revolved around simple aspects of life, everyday features we see but tend to ignore. For example, we look at the portrait of a town, but when we take a step back, we notice how the buildings are layed out and how they are as tall as the mountains in the background. This is what makes magical realism so keen to the eye, for it takes the modern world, but adds magical elements to it. It's almost as if it is like the Disney or Pixar movies, because it uses the real world but adds fictional elements to it. It was his job to create, and it was our job to believe. 

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During this time of excluding art, it was hard for many people to simply be happy or believe. This is where Kanoldt found his inspiration and aspired to create paintings for people to ponder about. These two pictures in the top row below support this idea for example the multi-color desk with books and books stacked on top of each other. Again to the right of it is shows, the landscape again being as tall as the mountains. The second picture to the right of the paragraphs show a deformed and deconstructed painting of 3 men playing poker. Aspects like this are what made magical realism what it is. 

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