Dora Hitz (b. Altdorf bei Nürnberg, Germany, 1856 – d. 1924, Berlin, Germany) was a court painter to the Romanian Royal Family, lived in Paris, was a member of the November Group, and was co-founder of the Berlin Secession. When she was six years old, her family moved to Ansbach and atthirteen, she was sent to Munich to study at the « Damenmalschule der Frau Staatsrat Weber », an art school for young women. At the Art and Industrial Exhibition of 1876, she met and became acquainted with Elisabeth of Wied, the Queen consort of Romania, and as a result, she was appointed as the Court Painter. After 1880, she lived in Paris and traveled throughout Brittany and Normandy and in 1890, became a member of the Salon of the Société des Artistes Français. Although she had been and would continue to be successful in Paris, she moved to Berlin in 1892 and joined the « Vereins Berliner Künstlerinnen und Kunstfreundinnen » (an association of female artists) that gave her access to many upper middle class clients who commissiond portraits.
