Chinese Political Movements

 

Storming the Gate - Attack, sheet 5 of the cycle »A Weavers’ Revolt« & The Sacrifice, sheet 1 of the series »War«, 1922

“[K]nowledge of the German artist Käthe Kollwitz in china owes a great deal to the writer and essayist Lu Xun. His internationalist version inspired him to spread in his county the works of the engravers from Germany”

            In this discovery art started to learn to break the established norm seen in Chinese printmaking, Kollwitz’s work gave them a look at the expressive marks depicting the realities of the lives as seen by mothers, lower class workers, and herself; of which was part of the art being seen in the art coming out of Germany. The series which inspired these artists the most were “A Weavers’ Revolt” and “War”. From these series/cycles they were inspired by the expressions of the revolting crowd and her focus on the community’s pain. Images from “A Weavers’ Revolt” inspired early wood engravings that were produced during the 1930s in Shanghai about agricultural workers, which resonates with the work. “…[T]he portrayal of an oppressed crowd forming one single body—galvanized by a feminine presence appearing to orchestrate and accompany the advance through a wave movement—caught the imagination of the advocates of engraving in China.”

“In September 1931, at the end of the meeting of a group of young left-wing activists, five of them – including the writer Rou Shi -- were arrested and summarily executed. To pay tribute to their deaths, Lu Xun printed Das Opfer (The Sacrifice) by Kollwitz in the review Beidao (the big bear), run by Ding Li T.” In doing this he too was calling forth the unjust actions taken towards men who wanted a change for the people; and stated the separation of the mother from her child’s similarity to that of men enlisting to serve in the war was like that of the loss of those men’s lives for the cause. Lu Xun also used this piece to talk about her work depicting the death of Karl Liebknecht (whose views were also circulating in Shanghai). The views of Kollwitz and Liebknecht conflicted with that of the Chinese government, aligning with the citizens of China like they did in Germany, and in the end it too resulted in the creation of work on social criticism.

Piotrowski, Piotr, Art Beyond Borders Artistic Exchange in Communist Europe. Pascal Dubourg Glatigny, and Jerôme Bazin. (1945-1989) Budapest, New York: Central European University Press, 2016.

First Image: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/cycle-weavers-revolt-overview

Second Image: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/series-war-overview

The War Series

The Sacrifice, sheet 1 of the series »War«, 1921/1922, & The Parents, sheet 3 of the series »War«, 1921/1922

“These pictures should be shown everywhere and tell people: this is how it was in the war, that’s what we all had to bear throughout these inexpressibly difficult years.” –Käthe Kollwitz

The war series is a small series comprised of 7 mid-sized woodcuts, which were inspired from moments she faced when agreeing to allow her son to join the military and fight in the war, which fueled her growing pacifism. When he passed she felt completely responsible for his death; in her grief she states in her diary that “[t]hey offer themselves up with joy. They offer themselves like a pure, clear flame rising up to heaven.” A beautifully poetic statement from a mother’s perspective on those, specifically Peter, who offer themselves to serve in the war. She furthers this statement by adding in her thoughts on what affect her children had on her life; “What he gave me [. . .] was something the like of which I had never known before. The piety of these young souls, the pure clarity of their flames. My young sons, my beloved flames, who led us rather than we you. Born of us, yet growing beyond us and taking us with you.” Her reluctance was there from the beginning into letting Peter serve, he was underage, and like other mothers she didn’t want to lose her baby. She depicts this in the first and second images of The War series titled “The Sacrifice” and “The Volunteers”. “The Sacrifice” best depicts this by showing a mother offering her child up in her arms to an unseen force, the unknown, “neither the encircling arms nor the womb-like darkness of the cloak can fully enclose and shelter the two figures.”  “The Parents” inspired the sculptures “…now standing in Vladso cemetery, where [her son] is buried, has often been seen as central to the commemoration of the Great War…” Both works depict scenes of two beings of which have been shattered by the news of a loved one, their child, who has passed. No parent wants to go through the process of burying their child, yet it was something the war brought upon them. Like her other works these allow for an outsider to make a connection to the work through either the understanding or experience of loss and grief. Of which resonates with what was mentioned about the “ugly” in an earlier post about the loss of a child. Kollwitz’s ability to illustrate this began to feel so real as years went on; she caused us to understand/feel the gut-wrenching and sickening feelings of the death of someone who holds such an importance in our lives.

Ingrid Sharp. "Kääthe Kollwitz's Witness to War: Gender, Authority, and Reception." Women in German Yearbook 27 (2011): 87-107.

Both images are from: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/series-war-overview

Motherhood and Being a Woman Artist

Mother with a Child in her Arms, final version, 1916 & Two Children at the Bannister, c 1927

            On a lighter note we move on to discuss her work involving children as a reflection of her own experiences and joys of motherhood. Kollwitz took great pride and love in her relationship with her boys, which can be seen in the light and looseness of her mark making. Before meeting her husband her father wished for her to solely focus on art as there was already a present stigma on a woman’s role in society and he did not want her to give up on something she was showing a great deal of passion towards. “The pressures on women artists to procreate in the domestic realm rather than to “create” in the public sphere were immense and the subject of all four artists’ direct and indirect experiences within the first decade of the new century.”

As the boys grew older and began to do their own thing she spent some time reminiscing of their younger years, noting the following in her diary. “I am gradually approaching the period in my life when work comes first. When both the boys went away for Easter, I hardly did anything but work. Worked, slept ate and went for short walks. But above all I worked. And yet I wonder whether the ‘blessing’ is not missing much from such work…formerly, in my so wretchedly limited working time, I was more productive because I was more sensual… Potency, potency is diminishing…” She considered the possibility of having another child but thought otherwise figuring this would be a good time to continue the production of work that had to be put on hold.

Price, Dorothy. Between Us Sleeps Our Child—art: Creativity, Identity, and the Maternal in the Works of Marianne Von Werefkin and Her Contemporaries. In Marianne Werefkin and the Women Artists in Her Circle, edited by Malycheva Tanja and Wünsche Isabel, 106-22. LEIDEN; BOSTON: Brill, 2017

Both Images are from: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/mothers-and-children-overview

Death

Death seizes the Children, sheet 3 of the series »Death«, 1934 & Death seizes a Woman, sheet 4 of the series »Death«, 1934

“Apart from physical pain and misery, the human condition is subject to the laws of life in that separation and death are part of everyone's life” -Helga Coulter (in reference to a diary entry by Kollwitz written in 1922)

Kollwitz acknowledgement and partial acceptance of death has been a prominent topic throughout her career; of which has focused on “…her need to produce art aimed at alleviating people's feelings of being at a loss and being overwhelmed at a time when such feelings were prevalent.”(*) If she could do such than it would potentially help herself with coming to terms with it as well, “She felt this to be her duty, a duty deeply rooted in her family history.”(*) Kollwitz writes: “The abyss still hasn’t closed. It has swallowed millions and it is still yawning,” (**) of which is best illustrated by the personification of death she created in this cycle of work. His presence is heavy and engulfs the figures before they are able to make an escape.

Through her work is a personal illustration of her pacifism, it is the overwhelming grief she experienced that allows it to be open enough to relate to other mothers. To keep the memory of the departed alive she created moving works with intentions of a push for change, to live in a world without war would be the ideal. “She sets the abstract concepts of redemptive sacrifice, of death for the nation, and her belief in life after death against the overwhelming significance of the embodied individual who dies and is gone” (**) To have witnessed the death and loss of so many in her life caused her to later take on the a bit of pessimism at the end of her life. She spent so many years trying to call attention to the results of war and a countries inattentiveness towards their civilians needs that she felt if we really wanted a change we would have to become more of a “brotherhood of man”.

(*)Coulter, Helga “Pictures on My Analyst’s Walls: Reflections on the Art of Kathe Kollwitz, the Nazis and the Art of Psychoanalyis.” British Journal of Psychotherapy Issue 4, no.32 (2016)

(**)Ingrid Sharp. "Kääthe Kollwitz's Witness to War: Gender, Authority, and Reception." Women in German Yearbook 27 (2011): 87-107.

Both images are from: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/series-death-overview

A Weavers' Revolt

Death, sheet 2 of the cycle »A Weavers’ Revolt«, 1893-1897 & Storming the Gate - Attack, sheet 5 of the cycle »A Weavers’ Revolt«, 1893-1897

“However much we feel we know the war; it is a superimposition of interpretations built up over time. Sometimes it is enough to recognize this and work with it but sometimes we need to look beneath, and quite simply, start afresh” - Gail Braybon

A Weavers' Revolt cycle depicts the idea of the original story “modernized” to fit the politics of the current social issues as seen in her lifetime. It does so by depicting a series of fictional scenes of citizen worker’s lives before, during and after taking a stand for improved working conditions. In wanting to influence individuals to take a stand for rights of lower class individuals in the work place, “Kollwitz compressed a wealth of associations into simple motifs. [. . .] Everything is expression, gesture and iconic form.” (*) There’s a softness to some of the Images, especially in the ones involving character death which says something about Kollwitz first inclinations of death as a somber experience, which changes after the death of her son Peter. This is not to say either depiction is wrong, more so it implies the insertion of a personal aspect to her work after experiencing such a gut-wrenching personal loss.

The images have a heavy mood due to her mark-making process in combination to her choice of materials. “For the cycle she chose the hard, practically grain less pear wood, working over several months at achieving a coherence of line, images, form, and shape in order to communicate with her audience as directly and clearly as possible. “ (*) Even with the fine detail found in the images we are still able to see aspects of her later work in these early images. The expressive and hard marks seen in the sky within the second image, as well as the detail found in the man at the lower left corner’s pants are examples of this. The mood in her work has always been there, that of progressive criticism emphasized by the darkness of the figures as seen in the first image. Death is a constant theme within Kollwitz work, of which we will take into the next post.

(*) Ingrid Sharp. "Kääthe Kollwitz's Witness to War: Gender, Authority, and Reception." Women in German Yearbook 27 (2011): 87-107.       

Both images are from: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/cycle-weavers-revolt-overview

Women at Work During the War

Poster for the German Cottage Industry Exhibition in Berlin, 1906 & Working-class Woman, 1906

In presenting issues found in lower income families Kollwitz was tasked to advertise for a show which was supposed to open in a poverty stricken area, forcing the rich to pass through them to get to the exhibition. In this it allowed for the start of a discussion on the working class, later sparking her series on “A Weavers Rebellion,” of which has been reserved for the next post. Here we will be discussing the industry and issues the lower class (specifically lower class women) faced in terms of working for companies during the time of war.

There were career options that were already open for women before the war where they produced textiles and other resources, “[t]he extent of the transformation has often been exaggerated, since before 1914 large numbers of women already labored in Germany’s industrial plants”(*) among those not included were machinery or ammunition; they did not cover the amount that could not work (those who needed to take care of their young or old). “But the demands of total war, of an economy and society that were completely mobilized to support Germany’s army on the field, meant that many women moved into metal working and munitions factories.”(*) This allowed these women to develop skills for jobs they previously had little or no access to. Though the work was hard, many found being able to make money to support their families again invigorating. Sadly this did not last long after the war as “[t]he forces of order—state officials, police, foremen and manager, even their own fathers, husbands and brothers… would try to ensure that the post war factory would remain a man’s world…” (*) thus resulting in the loss of jobs and independence they had rightfully worked for. “Grieving families had to face not only the ongoing pain of loss but also the difficulties of supporting themselves in the absence of a major breadwinner, especially in states where payments to dead soldiers’ families were nonexistent or insufficient.”(**) Something completely those of wealthier classes chose to ignore but were forced to see when attending this exhibition.

(*)Weitz, Eric D. Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy, Weimar Centennial Edition, 7-40. PRINCETON; OXFORD: Princeton University Press, 2018. 

(**)Proctor, Tammy M. Conclusion: Consequences of World War I. In Civilians in a World at War, 1914-1918, 267-76. NYU Press, 2010.

Both images are from: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/german-cottage-industry-exhibition-kn-95

Civilian Life During the Time of War (Women and Children)

Unemployment, 1909           &         Bread!, final version, 1924

           “Artistic creation did little to assuage her own pain, which mirrored the ache felt by so many German mothers.” – Eric Weitz

 Civilians lived harsh lives during the war, as women and children left behind did not have access to necessities. Unemployment being a leading factor behind a lot of issues as it left many with little to no money. Another group of which who suffered from similar issues (or had their homes destroyed from battle) were those who fled to new areas as refugees, as they did not only have to worry about this but were also treated unkindly by villagers, resulting in an even bigger crisis within their borders. If this was not enough of an issue “[i]n the winter of 1916-1917, children five to seven years old in Essen were allotted only one-quarter liter of milk three times per week.” This in comparison with the image above titled “Bread!” in which a mother makes the difficult decision of only feeding one of her starving children.

A similar instance which occurred during this time was reported by the Berlin police which stated that “there are innumerable families who are going day after day without butter or other fats and who are forced to eat their bread dry and to prepare their food without cooking fat…Even good, faithful patriots have begun to turn into pessimists” It was easy for Kollwitz to see all of this due to her husband’s occupation and location of her their home in Berlin. These instances were a big part in what inspired her to create work focused on social criticism towards the entirety of what was left behind at home during and after the war. As a mother and pacifist she felt driven to document such as to bring attention to such unjust inattentiveness to a country whose citizens are in need.

 Weitz, Eric D. Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy, Weimar Centennial Edition, 7-40. PRINCETON; OXFORD: Princeton University Press, 2018. 

Both images are from: https://www.kollwitz.de/en/social-criticism-overview