She studied dance, music and painting and by 1913 she was involved with the group of Expressionists which included Herwarth Walden's Sturm.

She was proclaimed Lothar Schreyer's "first student" and she moved with him to Hamburg where she was not only the costume creator but also a dancer.

They rejected conventional religion and expressionism as a complete solution and they would have liked to have lived without money.

Facing financial ruin, she died in Hamburg in 1924, having shot her partner and then herself.

[1] Berit Glanz' German novel Pixeltänzer is woven around the life and work of Lavinia and her husband and the question of how it relates to the present times.