Adolf Hölzel was one of the most influential pioneers of non-representational art in the 20th century. In the early 1920s, he discovered working in the pastel technique for himself, as the lower drawing possibilities of oil painting and the long working or drying process did not sufficiently accommodate his spontaneous and experimental creative urge. The radicality of his artistic approach led him to detach art from the object and, to an even greater extent, from the content, which is particularly evident in the titles of his pastel works: "Composition" In the most frequent cases, the subtitles referring to the content come from interpreters of his works, be they art historians or collectors.
Hölzel's approach of deliberate limitation to artistic means also enabled his students to venture beyond Impressionism. Hölzel is not least therefore a central position in the German art of the 20th century. Viewed in art historical retrospect, he remained the "cautious avant-gardist," leaving his peers behind, into old age. By becoming increasingly free and non-representational in the course of his artistic development, Hölzel takes art to a point that is not taken up and continued until the 1950s, especially by so-called "informal" art or in "concrete art". Isolated, as none of his peers leaves so far behind his own time and points so far to the future art, he has outgrown the 19th century and leaves deep traces in the art of the 20th century.