"There has never been a time when it has been shaken by this horror, shaken by this fear. The world had never been so silent, as silent as a graveyard. Man has never been so insignificant, never so restless. Happiness has never been so far away and difficult, and freedom has never been so lifeless. There was a piercing groan of grief, and the man called out to his soul. This whole stage of gestation is a great cry of pain. Art is also added to this vast dark series. She also calls, and she also calls to the soul: this is expressionism. ”
--Herman Bahr
Without a context to bring in, it is difficult to understand Bael's description of German Expressionism. If you have to experience Bahr's words in an instant audiovisual way, you can try to see the German Expressionist films of this period, 1920's "Dr. Carrigalee's Cabin", 1927's "Metropolis", 1931's "M is the Murderer", expressionist films, although only existed for a short time, the film is full of betrayal and madness, due to limited budget, many of the lighting effects in the film are done in the form of painting. Representation is the opposite of reproduction, and the object of reproduction is the real world, and the manifestation is the spiritual world of man. Kollwitz's paintings are like movie scenes, using the ultimate light and shadow and close-ups of people to set off the atmosphere.
It is true that it is somewhat arbitrary to pull Kollwitz directly into expressionism, but at the same time, in this context, Kollwitz's artistic career includes a process from reproduction to performance, and we can regard Kollwitz's early works as a period of devolution of expressionism, trying to find the origin of expressionism.
Judging from the temporal context of Kollwitz's artistic practice, Kollwitz's painting subjects are mainly divided into four categories: war themes in early years, maternal themes in middle age, death themes in later years, and self-portraits throughout life. Kollwitz has been experimenting with different mediums to express the content of painting, whether it is a sketch or a print, which can fully express his compassion for the poor and kind underclass and the trampling of life by war from the perspective of an ordinary woman.
Kollwitz's way of expressing emotions is still not divorced from the narrative of traditional painting, and stories play a major role in picture analysis. Light and shadow shaping is Kollwitz's unique skill, she is good at using pictures to express her wandering, bitterness, sympathy, sadness, she calls herself a brave and fearless warrior, which is fully reflected in her early creations.
The first painting in the 1897 "Weaver's Revolt" series, Kaiser Kollwitz (1892) 23.7x 29.6cm (print)
Second painting in the 1897 "Weaver's Revolt" series, Kaiser Kollwitz (1892) 27.4x 24.3cm (print)
Third painting in the 1897 "Weaver's Revolt" series, Kaiser Kollwitz (1892) 27.4x 24.3cm (print)
Fourth painting in the 1897 "Weaver's Revolt" series, Kaiser Kollwitz (1892) 24.4x 20.3cm (print)
Fifth painting in the 1897 "Weaver's Revolt" series, Kaiser Kollwitz (1892) 23.7x 29.6cm (prints)
Sixth painting in the 1897 "Weaver's Revolt" series, Kaiser Kollwitz (1892) 27.4x 24.3cm (print)
Kollwitz became known for his group painting The Weaver's Revolt. The Weaver's Revolt consists of seven paintings, six for exhibition and publication, inspired by Hauptmann's play The Weaver. The play shows the tragic situation of the people at the bottom of German society at that time living under the oppression of the bourgeoisie and the resistance of the working class, but in the end it was ruthlessly suppressed by the bourgeoisie.
Kollwitz expresses this theme by borrowing dramatic scene fragments that use the contrast between black and white to make the conflict of the picture more pronounced, showing the poor and hopeless mother guarding the bedside of the skinny, sick child; the hand of death finally falling on the young child; the workers plotting to protest and discuss countermeasures; the workers taking up arms in preparation for rebellion; and the workers rushing to the gates of the capitalists.
As Kollwitz entered middle age, the sacrifice of his son Peter on the battlefield in Belgium almost shattered Kollwitz's entire spirit, and his grandson lost his life in World War II. As an ordinary mother, the successive deaths of her sons and grandchildren made her deeply feel the cruelty and ruthlessness of the war, and when she watched young lives kill each other because of the ambitions of politicians, Kollwitz was extremely sad, which made her feel uneasy about the whole country and the future in addition to the pain of losing her son. During this period, Kollwitz created a number of creations with the theme of maternal love and children, and the picture was still dominated by its unique black and white form, which strengthened the sense of form of the picture and made the theme more prominent.
Scene arrangements in Kollwitz's early works have disappeared, locking objects directly into figures, mostly charcoal and copperplate engravings. The delicate lines are transformed into flexible carbon brushes, which not only represent the improvement of painting skills, but more importantly, "performance", through blurring details, to show the posture and expression of the characters, and the sadness is the combination of Germany's tragic social situation and character experience.
Mother and Dead Child, 5th edition, Kaiser Kollwitz (1934)
The 1903 print "Mother and The Dead Child" depicts a desperate mother clinging to her recently deceased child, whose emaciated body is surrounded by the mother's wide arms, and the child's paralyzed body, the head hanging on its back, and the mother's muscled body strained by the force.
The absence of the scene dilutes the narrative, and the identity of the mother and child may not be so important, and what we can feel is the despair of the mother. Kollwitz changed the draft several times before it was finalized, the full composition made the whole atmosphere of the picture appear heavy and gloomy, the triangular composition showed the solid and stable image of the mother, this work not only showed the tragic fate of the lower classes of women and poor families in German society at that time, but also contained the artist's despair of the middle-aged lost son and the tenacity of motherhood to protect the bereaved son.
Farewell ( Keser Kollwitz ( 1910 ) (charcoal painting)
Death, Woman and Child (1910) Lithograph by Kaiser Kollwitz (1910).
Kollwitz's later years were more about the examination of life, that is, the performance of the subject of death, which was involved in some of the maternal themes painted by Kollwitz in middle age. At this time, the image of the god of death in the picture appears evil and mysterious, through the symbolic image of the god of death to show the imminent end of life, to the late creation of Kollwitz's work on the depiction of the image of the god of death has changed, the god of death from the shape of the skeleton gradually changed into the image of adults, but its modeling characteristics are still emaciated and terrifying, from the transformation of the image of the god of death, we can see the change in Kollwitz's inner understanding of death.
Mother with two children (Mother with Two Children) Bronze sculpture by Kather Kollwitz (1932-1936).
Death seizes a Woman ( 1934 ) crayon prints by Kathel Kollwitz (1934 edition).
In Kollwitz's early "The Weaver's Rebellion and Death", in which the child is about to leave, the god of death symbolizes death appears, and the image is a skeleton. In 1910's Death and the Woman, a mother is firmly held behind by a skeleton-shaped Grim Reaper, the mother's body twists and struggles, and the young child longs for the mother's embrace to appear painful and helpless, the Grim Reaper depicted here is ruthless and evil, and the similar image of the Grim Reaper is created in 1911.
It was not until the later stages of Kollwitz's creation that the image of the grim reaper changed from an evil and merciless image to a sympathizer with compassion. In the 1934 creation of "Death Embraces the Girl", we can see a sad girl leaning in the arms of the god of death, and the god of death in the picture changes its usual horror and vicious appearance, but instead gives the girl a hug, and the body movements reveal the compassion for the girl.
From the eight sets of lithographs "Parting and Death" created in 1924, "The Woman Sitting on the Knee of death" created in 1921, and "Friends with death" created in 1935, we can see that Kollwitz's depiction of the image of the god of death gradually has human appearance and emotional characteristics, getting rid of the ruthless and cold skeleton shape, and more mixed with some feelings of pity, from which we can see that Kollwitz's understanding of death is also changing. As Kollwitz said in his later years: "I still have fears of death— but death, and I often think that this is a good idea." ”
Self-portrait by Kaiser Kollwitz (1899) (pen drawing)
Self-portrait towards left (1901)
Self-portrait en face ( 1910 ) by Kaiser Kollwitz ( sketch )
Self-portrait by Kaiser Kollwitz (1915) (crayon prints)
Self-portrait in profile towards right By Kaiser Kollwitz (1938) (crayon prints)
Kollwitz's self-portrait is a self-narrated history that describes Kollwitz's own living conditions and mental outlook, and also embodies Kollwitz's aesthetic attitude of "ugliness is beauty". "Ugly can be beautiful: but something beautiful can never be. Kollwitz never made any embellishments to her self-portraits, and was always faithful to her inner expression of emotions, and her later self-portraits even gave people an "ugly" feeling.
The image of the mother in Kollwitz's work "The Mourning Mother" originated from the painter himself, and the Volkscal Observer, the central organ of the German Nazi Party at the time, wrote an article mocking Kollwitz: "Thank God that no German mother looks like this." Of course, the Nazi evaluation of Kollwitz was political, but from the self-portrait of Kollwitz's life, "beauty is ugly" is Kollwitz's aesthetic standard for artistic creation.