Bernhard Dörries was born in Hanover in 1898. From 1917 to 1918 he studied architecture at the Technical University in Hanover, but then switched to painting. In 1919 he joined the Hannoversche Sezession. In 1937 he was awarded the Grand Prix at the Paris World Exhibition for a portrait of a girl. From 1938 to 1945 and from 1955 to 1967 he was a professor at the University of the Fine Arts, West Berlin. Dörries died in Bielefeld (North Rhine-Westphalia) in 1978.