Printmaker and painter, born in Wurttemberg, Germany, into a Jewish family. From an early age drawing became a passion and refuge for his shy nature, but his parents wanted a commercial career for him, so he became a window dresser in Dortmund. Conscripted in 1916, in 1917 Fechenbach was badly injured, having a leg amputated. In 1918 he began training at a Stuttgart handicraft school for invalids, graduating to studies of painting and restoration at the Stuttgart and Munich Academies, 1919–22, Max Liebermann being an influence. A year studying classical artists in Florence from 1923 was followed by travels through Pisa, Venice, Vienna and Amsterdam. Returned to Stuttgart in 1924, Fechenbach worked and showed in the contemporary style. In 1930 he married the photographer Greta Batze and they taught students in their studio until Nazi pressure led them to England in 1939.
Text source: 'Artists in Britain Since 1945' by David Buckman (Art Dictionaries Ltd, part of Sansom & Company)