Otto Knille

Otto Knille (10 September 1832, Osnabrück - 7 April 1898, Merano) was a German history painter; associated with the Düsseldorfer Malerschule.

While attending the gumnasium there, he began to display artistic talent, so he received lessons from a local landscape painter.

In 1848, he went to the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, where he studied with Karl Ferdinand Sohn, Theodor Hildebrandt and Friedrich Wilhelm von Schadow.

One of his most familiar works came from this period: Herausforderung zum Kampf (Challenge to the Struggle), a series of five panels celebrating Prussia's victory in the Franco-Prussian War.

In 1897, he wrote a monograph; Wollen und Können in der Malerei (Willingness and Ability in Painting).