Maximillian (Max) Kurzweil studied at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna with Christian Griepenkerl and Leopold Carl Müller, followed by the Académie Julian in Paris from 1892, where he exhibited his first painting at the Salon in 1894. He was co-founder of the Vienna Secession in 1897, and was the editor and illustrator of the influential Secessionist magazine Ver Sacrum (Sacred Spring). Kurzweil was also a professor at the Frauenkunstschule, a Viennese academy for female artists. In 1905, he was awarded the first ever Villa Romana prize, which is now the oldest German art award. As a consequence of private circumstances, made worse by his innate sense of melancholy, he committed suicide in 1916 together with his student and lover, Helene Heger. Despite his relatively short career, Kurzweil belongs to the most significant representatives of the Viennese Secessionist movement, along with Gustav Klimt and Kolomon Moser.