Lyonel Charles Feininger (July 17, 1871 – January 13, 1956) was a German-American painter and caricaturist.

Lyonel Feininger was born in New York to German immigrant parents. He left for Europe in 1887 to study music, but soon turned to art which he studied at the Königliche Akademie in Berlin under Ernst Hancke, art schools in Berlin with Karl Schlabitz, and in Paris with sculptor Filippo Colarossi.

He quickly established a reputation as one of the foremost political cartoonists in Germany before being offered a contract to produce caricatures for the Chicago Sunday Tribune, for which he created one of his most famous strips in 1906, ‘The Kin-der-Kids’.

Feininger only started working as an artist at the age of 36 (in 1907), dedicated himself to painting. On a visit to Paris he came into contact with Cubism and, with the support of Robert Delaunay, he began to develop a distinctive style of painting.
He became a member of the Berliner Sezession in 1909, was associated with expressionist group Die Brücke, the Novembergruppe, Gruppe 1919, the Blaue Reiter (Blue Rider) circle and Blaue Wier (The Blue Four).

He remained in Germany throughout the World War I, and in 1919 joined the Bauhaus school where he taught until its closure by in 1933.
During this period he developed his woodcutting techniques. Famously, he designed the cover for the Bauhaus 1919 manifesto: an expressionist woodcut ‘Cathedral’.

Since 1933, the situation became unbearable for Feininger and his wife, who was partly Jewish. After his work was exhibited in the Degenerate Art (Entartete Kunst) organized by The Nazis, they returned to the United States in 1937, and remained in New York for the rest of they life.

Feininger’s style took on the mannerisms of analytical Cubism. He made use of rhythmic interpretations of natural forms, studied the effects of transparency and prismatic planes, and used light to reconstruct elements from the real world. He was fascinated with seascapes and the urban views presented in Manhattan.

His work is highly individual and is highly regarded. While a lot of his early work featured quite reserved colouring, he actually became more vigorous later in life, incorporating much more vibrant colours into his work. He always claimed his first love was music, but it is his artwork that will be remembered.

Feininger was one of the very few fine artists also to draw comic strips as a cartoonist. His works were noted for their humor and graphic experimentation.
Feininger was also a pianist and composer, with several piano compositions and fugues for organ extant.
His son, Andreas Feininger, became famous as a photographer of New York City.