Käthe Kollwitz was a late exponent of German Expressionism, and a pioneering artist in her own right. Her art dealt with personal tragedy and loss but also terrible social problems, as she saw her country decimated by two world wars – the first claimed the life of her son and the second that of her grandson. Amongst the 40 haunting monochrome prints on display, all borrowed from the British Museum, is Tod und Frau (1910), meaning “death and woman”, in which a woman grapples with a deathly skeletal figure while a small child clings to her.
Born in the Prussian city of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad, Russia) in 1867, Käthe Kollwitz established herself in an art world dominated by men by developing an aesthetic vision centered on women and the working class. Her representations of women, including her frequent self-portraits, effectively communicated her subjects’ predicaments during a period when women were still negotiating ways to represent themselves in the arts. While her naturalistic style appeared out of touch in an era that witnessed the birth of abstraction, her depictions of universal human experiences, given depth and emotional power through her dense networks of lines and light and dark contrasts, were also reflective of her time. The loss of her son during World War I, for instance, led to a lifelong exploration of the subject of mourning. She also found many of her motifs in her husband’s medical clinic for workers and people in need, where she also kept her studio.
Portrait of the Artist: Käthe Kollwitz. Ikon, Birmingham, 13 September – 26 November.
