Self-Portrait with Red Scarf is an oil on canvas painting by Max Beckmann, executed in 1917.

[1][2] The physician soldier Max Beckmann, who had joined the German Army at World War I enthusiastically, experienced the horrors of warfare in the Western Front and Flanders, suffering a serious nervous collapse in July 1915.

In his own words, the war impressions made him want to "enclose the unspeakable things of life in... sharp, crystalline surfaces and lines".

The symbol of the cross can be seen as suggesting the artist as a martyr, while the red scarf also seems to represent his rebellion against the circumstances.

"[1] The painting was acquired by the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart in 1924, but was confiscated by the Nazi regimen in 1937, during their purge of so-called Degenerate art.