Stein Otto Th. W.

Biography

Otto Th. W. Stein (January 23, 1877 in Saaz, Bohemia, Austria-Hungary, and November 1958 in Friedland, Czechoslovakia) was a Czechoslovakian draftsman and painter of German origin. He studied painting in Vienna, Prague, Karlsruhe, and Paris. In 1913, he co-founded the New Secession in Munich.
Stein worked mainly as a painter and graphic artist in Chemnitz and Berlin, where he was close to the Free Secession. Persecuted by the Nazis because of his Jewish origin, he emigrated to Prague in 1935, then survived the Holocaust as a prisoner in the Theresienstadt concentration camp. After the war, he settled in Friedland.
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Married to Elena Dubler in 1902/03, whose marriage ended in 1924, Stein was forgotten in Germany but regained some prominence in 2015 thanks to Edward Engelberg's research of his works. In 1913, Stein wrote a visionary essay on the cinematograph, predicting its future impact on the press and television.