Her father encouraged her artistic talents and, at age 12, enrolled her in a boarding school of the Sisters of Loreto in Simbach am Inn, about 30 kilometres away.

Hummel continued to grow in her abilities, and after graduation in 1927 she enrolled in the prestigious Academy of Applied Arts in Munich, where her talent and skills developed.

While living there, she made friends with two members of the Congregation of the Franciscan Sisters of Sießen in Bad Saulgau who were also studying at the Academy.

[3] After Berta graduated in 1931 with top honors, she chose to follow a religious calling that she had felt for some time and applied to enter that congregation, and was admitted in April 1931 as a postulant.

[2] After completing her novitiate year, Hummel was assigned to teach art in a nearby school run by the convent.

In 1934, it also published a collection of her drawings, titled Das Hummel-Buch, with poetic text by the Austrian writer Margarete Seemann.

[2] Soon afterward, Franz Goebel, the owner of a porcelain company, was looking for a new line of artwork, and happened to see some of these postcards in a shop in Munich.

Hummel agreed, mostly for its saving the employment of many workers, and the convent granted him sole rights to make figurines based on her art.

A decade later, the figurines would gain popularity in the United States when returning American soldiers brought them home.

One Nazi magazine, Der SA-Mann (issue of 23 March 1937), wrote of her work: "There is no place in the ranks of German artists for the likes of her" and: "No, the beloved Fatherland cannot remain calm when Germany's youth are portrayed as brainless sissies".