New Objectivity (Art)

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Carl Grossberg, jacquard weaving mill, 1934

With New Objectivity refers to the return to the world of the visible. It began immediately after the First World War, at the same time as many artists turned to socially critical visual themes ( George Grosz , Otto Dix , Christian Schad and many others). It established itself as a leading art movement in the Weimar Republic. The time frame is commonly equated with the Weimar Republic .

Meaning and history

Alexander Kanoldt: Still Life I / Flower Pots , 1926

The New Objectivity was a formative style in the German Empire in the interwar period with leading representatives such as George Grosz, Otto Dix, Carl Grossberg , Alexander Kanoldt , Karl Hubbuch , Franz Radziwill , Christian Schad, Georg Scholz and Georg Schrimpf . It was not limited to Germany, but also developed in Austria ( Sergius Pauser , Rudolf Wacker ), Switzerland ( Niklaus Stöcklin , François Barraud ) and the Netherlands ( Pyke Koch ). After the First World War and under the influence of serious socio-political upheavals that culminated in the Weimar Republic , the New Objectivity developed under the influence of the Italian Pittura metafisica as an art that, after the upheavals and utopias of the avant-garde, became an object again in the sense of disillusionment , has found its way back to the everyday object, a clear image concept and an objectifying method of representation. The call for order (Retour à l'ordre, Return to order), which was already loud in France during the First World War , initiated a renewed return to principles of order and artistic traditions (e.g. painting style) in art as well.

The exhibition title Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) became part of the program . German painting since Expressionism , Gustav Friedrich Hartlaub , director of the Kunsthalle Mannheim , summarized the leading representatives - including Max Beckmann , who played a special role - in a traveling exhibition in 1925 . The highly acclaimed exhibition of post- expressionist art brought different artistic personalities to a common denominator. Based on the notion of a crisis-ridden present, Hartlaub divided the New Objectivity into a veristic-socially critical wing and a more classic-conservative wing, which reacted seismographically in the sense of a tendency to criticize and flee to the time of upheaval perceived as a crisis.

Art between social stability and melancholy?

The sobriety of this art direction in, for example, Carl Grossberg and Alexander Kanoldt was related to the stable social conditions in the mid-twenties and the prevailing cultural and technical values. "So it is said by Ursula Horn (1972) that the New Objectivity, by emphasizing the thing-like, static and sober, reflects traits of the technicalist basic attitude of modern management and engineering, a view of reality as it corresponds to capitalist rationalization." The reason why the pictures seem so technical is that every emotion was considered irrelevant. Efforts were made to achieve the greatest possible reduction. The reference to the writings of the sociologist and economist Max Weber, who died in Munich in 1920, and his topic of rationalization is unmistakable: The New Objectivity is an expression of the effectiveness and stabilization of capitalist mass production, which breaks with bourgeois ideas of individuality and cosiness and for the depersonalization of the creative and contributes to artistic forms of expression.

The French cultural historian Jean Clair analyzed the New Objectivity as an expression of the melancholy of the interwar period and thus contradicted the usual doctrine. The special existence, the difficult, the melancholy of these artists came into focus. Avant-garde - or tradition? The sociologist and philosopher Karl Mannheim , who did his habilitation between 1922 and 1925 with Max Weber's brother, the cultural sociologist Alfred Weber , is already important as an early indicator of a completely different interpretation thanks to the term he coined as the free-floating intelligence .

Beate Reese has attempted to link Jean Clair's New Objectivity to the tradition of the Saturnian and Albrecht Dürer's theme of melancholy and his masterpiece Melencolia I , to locate it historically, and to substantiate and develop it with a wealth of sources and documents. However, this completely different approach has received little attention to this day.

The year 1925: art and its perspective

Poster by Karl Bertsch for the 1925 exhibition in Mannheim

1925 was a decisive year for the art of New Objectivity. In 1925, however, Franz Roh's publication Post-Expressionism also appeared. Magical realism. The term post-expressionism did not catch on. In the young Weimar Republic , the pioneering exponents of Expressionism such as Erich Heckel , Karl Schmidt-Rottluff and Max Pechstein achieved high recognition. We cannot speak of a replacement of Expressionism by the New Objectivity. Rather, the New Objectivity developed rather at the same time as moderate Expressionism and the Bauhaus avant-garde. Due to the largely lacking supportive structures, it received only a brief public response: As early as 1930, attacks by the National Socialist and Communist parties against the New Objectivity increased.

The Mannheim exhibition was the only major exhibition on New Objectivity in Germany. There was another big one in Amsterdam in 1929 ( Tentoonstelling van de Onafhankelyken . Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, with de groep Duitsche “Neue Sachlichkeit”), at which Carl Grossberg was also represented.

An exhibition on the subject of the New Objectivity turning towards a new Romanticism: German Romantic Painting of the Present took place in 1932 in the Schwörhaus Museum of the Ulm City Hall.

Further exhibitions were organized by the Kunsthalle Mannheim in 1932/33 under the title Tranquil Objectivity (traveling exhibition) and by the Kestner Society in Hanover in 1933 on the topic of New German Romanticism.

The heterogeneous New Objectivity

In terms of artistic origin and the respective work development, the artists summed up under the term New Objectivity are extremely heterogeneous. Born many times around 1890, some representatives of New Objectivity were initially close to Expressionism and Dadaism during and immediately after the First World War (Otto Dix, Grosz, Franz Radziwill, Christian Schad, Gert H. Wollheim ). Others, on the other hand, had an academic degree (Georg Scholz) or a solid professional training, for example as a decorative painter ( Walter Schulz-Matan ), while others were self-taught (Georg Schrimpf). Except for the Hanoverian New Objectives around Bernhard Dörries and the Cologne Progressives around Heinrich Hoerle , no group formations with a program can be proven. Nevertheless, focal points in southwest Germany (Georg Scholz, Wilhelm Schnarrenberger , Karl Hubbuch), in Munich, in the Rhineland ( Anton Räderscheidt ), in Berlin and northern Germany with references to regional art traditions can be identified. Links are also the influences of students and teachers as well as loose relationships between artists and their respective places of activity. There were also a number of loners such as Albert Aereboe and Gottfried Brockmann . Carl Grossberg, for example, has ties to the Weimar Bauhaus.

New Objectivity themes

The resumption of genre painting and the exploration of the respective genre boundaries are characteristic of New Objectivity. Portraits , landscapes , city views ( vedute ) and above all the still life make up a large proportion of the art production, to which Kristina Heide has dedicated herself in a special way. Traditional image types such as the window picture or the studio interior are taken up and reinterpreted, also with regard to the reflection of artistic existence in modern society. Nude painting plays a major role . Motifs that were previously not considered worthy of art are included in the painting: advertising pillars and billboards as well as new technologies such as lightbulbs, gramophones, radios and factory architecture determine the environment and everyday life. The oscillation between near-time and distant from the world , awareness of tradition and modernity, melancholy and belief in progress characterize the art of New Objectivity in particular.

Avant-garde and art business

In the end, there was only one major exhibition of the New Objectivity in Germany . The artists, who were based on the old masters' technique and conception of form, were unable to cope with the dynamics of the time and the art industry , which was splitting into different interest groups, and the increasingly heated political situation. A main question in this dissertation: How do you recognize avant-gardes? What should avant-gardes achieve? The catastrophe hit the individual artists in very different ways in 1933. The New Objectivity as the failure of an entire generation. The Nazi femme exhibition Degenerate Art of 1937 made the criminal matter clear for many New Objectivity artists - for many not.

Criticism of the New Objectivity - Success Story after 1945

More detailed research has only recently been carried out into the criticism of and strategies for adapting individual representatives to National Socialism ( Olaf Peters , Beate Reese, James A. v. Dyke).

The attempt by some artists (Karl Hubbuch, Franz Radziwill) to continue the New Objectivity after the end of National Socialism and to repaint earlier and lost pictures (Franz Radziwill) was unsuccessful. Only with the advent of Pop Art and a new realism was the New Objectivity rediscovered in the 1960s, especially by the Italian art dealer Emilio Bertonati .

In 1969, Wieland Schmied's standard work, New Objectivity and Magical Realism, appeared in Germany from 1918 to 1933.

The first German exhibition after 1945: Berlin 1961. New Objectivity. House at the forest lake. Erich Wegner , Otto Möller etc.

In the 1960s, the first efforts of the Kunsthalle Mannheim with its directors Walter Passarge and Heinz Fuchs began to bring about the outstanding tradition of New Objectivity in their house. One could speak of a first remake . This activity of the Kunsthalle continues to this day. It is important to point out not only the history of the exhibition but also the history of the collection. 1994: First review (research) of the genesis of the exhibition from 1925 by Manfred Fath and Hans-Jürgen Buderer. (See also note 8.) 1994: First processing (research) of the collection and collection history of the Kunsthalle Mannheim by Karoline Hille.

The New Objectivity is an integral part of exhibition operations worldwide. With many exhibitions, analyzes of art history and in art magazines, attempts have been made to this day to come closer to the phenomenon of New Objectivity.

The art after the First World War is represented in the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus by a selection of important works of the New Objectivity, which are paradigmatic for the art and cultural politics of the 1920s and 1930s. The historical breaks and faults are exemplarily represented by major works such as Georg Schrimpf's portrait of Oskar Maria Graf (1918), Rudolf Schlichter's portrait by Bertolt Brecht (around 1926), Operation (1929) by Christian Schad, Josef Scharl's Fallen Soldier (1932), and Franz Radziwill's The Submarine War / Total War / Lost Earth (around 1938/39 - 1960).

Currents

The New Objectivity is usually divided into three separate currents: Verism, Classicism and Magical Realism.

Verism

In Verism , the New Objectivity is shaped as a political art that deals critically with the society of the Weimar Republic and showed solidarity with socialist and communist goals. But art historians also point to the opposite direction, the development of some artists from the New Objectivity in the direction of National Socialism. Examples of this in Austria are Sergius Pauser and Ernst Nepo .

The most important representatives of the New Objectivity were Otto Dix , August Wilhelm Dressler , Albert Birkle , Christian Schad , George Grosz , Conrad Felixmüller , Bernhard Kretzschmar , Georg Schrimpf , Karl Hubbuch , Wilhelm Schnarrenberger , Rudolf Schlichter , and Karl Rössing . The Verists developed one of the best-known topoi of the New Objectivity in the form of content-wise provocative representations, often exaggerated to the point of grotesque , using old-master techniques.

classicism

The emergence of New Objectivity, with its recourse to traditional techniques and painting styles, also gave space to a politically less interested group of painters who were formally influenced by a post- futurist group of artists around the Italian magazine Valori Plastici (including Giorgio de Chirico ). Their most important representatives were Georg Schrimpf, Rudolf Dischinger and Alexander Kanoldt , with their academic style they are considered the idyllic of the Weimar Republic.

Magical realism

The division of the New Objectivity into Veristen and Classicists was already carried out by Gustav Friedrich Hartlaub at the "Baptism". In contrast, Franz Roh introduced the term magical realism . Initially used to compete with the generic term, it is now used to describe a third trend that can be understood as a bridge to surrealism . The best-known representative of "Magical Realism" is Franz Radziwill , other representatives are Richard Oelze , Carl Grossberg and Herbert Böttger .

Visual artists of the New Objectivity

See also

literature

  • Hans-Jürgen Buderer: New Objectivity. Images in search of reality. Figurative painting of the twenties. Edited and with a foreword by Manfred Fath. Prestel, Munich et al. 1994, ISBN 3-7913-1379-7 .
  • Birgit Dalbajewa (Ed.): New Objectivity in Dresden. Sandstein-Verlag, Dresden 2011, ISBN 978-3-942422-57-4 .
  • Uwe Fleckner, Dirk Luckow (Ed.): The true face of our time. Images of people in the drawing of the New Objectivity. Kunsthalle zu Kiel, Kiel 2004, ISBN 3-937208-07-0 (exhibition catalog).
  • Christian Fuhrmeister (ed.): "The strongest expression of our days". New objectivity in Hanover. Catalog of the exhibition in the Sprengel Museum Hannover 2001/2002. Georg Olms Verlag, Hildesheim et al. 2001, ISBN 3-487-11440-2 .
  • Peter Hoeres: The culture of Weimar. Breakthrough of modernity (= German history in the 20th century. Vol. 5). Be.Bra Verlag, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-89809-405-4 .
  • Jutta Hülsewig-Johnen: New Objectivity - Magical Realism. Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Bielefeld 1990 (catalog for the exhibition in the Kunsthalle Bielefeld).
  • Britta Jürgs (Ed.): Unfortunately I have completely forgotten how to fly. Portraits of artists and writers of the New Objectivity. Aviva, Grambin et al. 2000, ISBN 3-932338-09-X .
  • Sergiusz Michalski: New Objectivity. Painting, graphics and photography in Germany 1919–1933. Taschen, Cologne et al. 1992, ISBN 3-8228-2370-8 .
  • Gerd Presler : Splendor and misery of the 20s. The painting of the New Objectivity. dumont Tb 285, Cologne 1992, ISBN 3-7701-2825-7 .
  • Fritz Schmalenbach : The painting of the new objectivity. Mann, Berlin 1973, ISBN 3-7861-4097-9 .
  • Wieland Schmied : New Objectivity and Magical Realism in Germany 1918–1933. Fackelträger-Verlag, Hanover 1969.
  • Klaus Schröder: New Objectivity. Austria 1918–1938. Kunstforum Bank Austria, Vienna 1995 (exhibition catalog).
  • Hans Gotthard Vierhuff: The New Objectivity. Painting and photography (= DuMont pocket books 96). DuMont, Cologne 1980, ISBN 3-7701-1220-2 .

Web links

Commons : New Objectivity  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Art Lexicon. New Objectivity. Contribution to the website of Hatje Cantz Verlag. Retrieved March 17, 2016.
  2. ↑ Klaus Petersen: "New Objectivity": Concept of style, epoch designation or group phenomenon? In: German quarterly for literary studies and intellectual history. Vol. 56, No. 3, 1982, ISSN  0012-0936 , pp. 463-477.
  3. ↑ Jan Dix about his father Otto Dix. On Youtube. Retrieved March 19, 2018.
  4. ↑ Sergiusz Michalski: New Objectivity. New Objectivity - Painting in Germany in the 1920s. ( Preview in Google Book Search, accessed March 18, 2016).
  5. ↑ Britta Jürgs (ed.): Unfortunately I have completely forgotten how to fly. Portraits of artists and writers of the New Objectivity. Aviva, Grambin 2000, ISBN 3-932338-09-X . Entry on Aviva publisher's website , accessed March 19, 2016.
  6. ^ Art: Sliding swell form. The Mannheimer Kunsthalle is attempting a major reprise of its epoch show Neue Sachlichkeit . Article on the online portal of the news magazine Der Spiegel. l3. October 1994. Retrieved March 14, 2016.
  7. ^ German post-expressionism. Footnote 18. Ursula Horn: New Objectivity - Direction and Collective Term? Fine Arts 9 (1972). Pp. 429-33. ( Preview in Google Book Search, accessed March 14, 2016).
  8. ↑ Beate Reese: Melancholy in the painting of the New Objectivity. European university publications. Series XXVIII Art History. Bd./Vol 321. Frankfurt am Main 1998. ISBN 3-631-32078-7 . Here: Chapter 1. New objectivity and melancholy - a contradiction? Problem, terminology and method, p. 13. Entry on the website of Museen Nord. Network collections - secure culture. , accessed March 19, 2016.
  9. ↑ Lexicon: The New Objectivity and the Objective Style. On the Ketterer Kunst website. Retrieved March 17, 2016.
  10. ↑ Beate Reese: Melancholy in the painting of the New Objectivity. European university publications. Series XXVIII Art History. Bd./Vol 321. Frankfurt am Main 1998, ISBN 3-631-32078-7 . Here: Chapter 2.2.1. Jean Clair's Research Approach to Interwar Melancholy, pp. 26–28.
  11. ↑ Beate Reese: Melancholy in the painting of the New Objectivity. European university publications. Series XXVIII Art History. Bd./Vol 321. Frankfurt am Main 1998, ISBN 3-631-32078-7 . Here: Chapter 1. New objectivity and melancholy - a contradiction? Problem, terminology and method, pp. 13–19, especially pp. 16 f .; Chapter 4.4. Recourse to medieval ideas of melancholy, pp. 71–101, Chapter 4.4.1. Saturn as a sign of a disordered society, pp. 72–75; Chapter 7. Melancholy as an artistic reflex of a heightened awareness of crisis in the early thirties, pp. 183–222.
  12. ^ Eva Karcher: Eros and death in the work of Otto Dix. Reading list. ( Preview in Google Book Search, accessed March 18, 2016).
  13. ↑ Entry in the Ulm City Archives. City chronicle 1925 - 1949. Events in Ulm based on the Ulmer daily newspapers (selection). ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Entry on the website of http://www.stadtarchiv.ulm.de./ Retrieved on March 18, 2016. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ulm.de
  14. ↑ Tradition and awakening. Würzburg and the art of the 1920s. Conception of the exhibition and catalog: Bettina Keß, Beate Reese. With a foreword by: Marlene Lauter. With texts by: Bettina Keß, Beate Reese, Suse Schmuck. Museum in the Kulturspeicher Würzburg. Königshausen & Neumann. Exhibition cat. November 15, 2003 - January 11, 2004, ISBN 3-8260-2763-9 (publisher) ISBN 3-928155-47-4 (museum). ( Preview in Google Book Search, accessed March 18, 2016).
  15. ↑ The ostracized masterpiece. The fate of modern art in the "Third Reich". Edited by Uwe Fleckner. Academy publishing house. Footnote 41. ( Preview in Google Book Search, accessed March 18, 2016).
  16. ↑ Kristina Heide, Form and Iconography of Still Life in Painting of New Objectivity. Diss. Freiburg 1992. Weimar 1998. ISBN 3-89739-021-3 .
  17. ↑ Christian J. Meier: The New Objectivity as Style: Ways to a style-analytical delimitation of the New Objectivity as an art movement of the Weimar Republic. Berlin 2012. ISBN 978-3-8442-2006-3 (criticism of the concept of the epoch style). ( Preview in Google Book Search, accessed March 19, 2016).
  18. ↑ Janina Nentwig: On the representation of nudes in painting of the New Objectivity. Diss. 2009. Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, Bern, Brussels, New York, Oxford, Vienna 2011. (Schriften zur bildenden Kunst, Vol. 14.) (Here with a current research overview.) Entry on the online portal of the German Digital Library . German National Library. http://www.dnb.de . Retrieved March 19, 2016.
  19. ↑ Janina Nentwig: Narration and open work of art in the nude representation of the New Objectivity. Image Knowledge Technology / The limits of narration in images. PDF on kunsttexte.de. Retrieved March 19, 2016.
  20. ↑ James A. van Dyke: Franz Radziwill and the Contradictions of German Art History, 1919-1945. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2011. ISBN 9780472116287 . Olaf Peters, New Objectivity and National Socialism: Affirmation and Criticism 1931 - 1947. Diss. Bochum 1996, Berlin 1998. ISBN 9783496011828 .
  21. ↑ Markus Heinzelmann : The landscape painting of the New Objectivity and its reception at the time of National Socialism. Frankfurt am Main, among other things, entry on the OCLC online portal: World Cat. http://www.worldcat.org./ Retrieved March 19, 2016.
  22. ^ Bazon Brock : Aesthetics as Mediation. Published by: Karla Fohrbeck. Released January 1, 1977. Entry on the Bazon Brock ON-DUTY THINKER website. Retrieved March 18, 2016.
  23. ↑ Olaf Peters: Painting of the New Objectivity. The recovery and re-evaluation of an era style. In: Kunstchronik, Issue 8, August 2000, pp. 379−390. (Here: review of Beate Reese's dissertation, pp. 386−387 ).
  24. ↑ Olaf Peters. Main focus of work and research. Entry on the website of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg. Retrieved March 18, 2016.
  25. ↑ Beate Reese: Publications. Entries in the online catalog of the German National Library. Retrieved March 23, 2016.
  26. ↑ James A. v. Dyke: Publications. Department of Art History and Archeology. ( Memento of the original from March 24, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Entry on the University of Missouri website. Retrieved March 18, 2016. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / aha.missouri.edu
  27. ↑ Bernhard Lypp: Aesthetic absolutism and political reason - to conflict of reflection and morality in German idealism. Suhrkamp Verlag, 1972, ISBN 978-3-11-028826-1 . Quoted in: Klaus Garber : Ways to Modernity. Historiographical, literary and philosophical studies from the area of ​​the old European Arcadia utopia. Edited by: Stefan Anders and Axel E. Walter. Entry on the Google Books portal . Retrieved March 17, 2016.
  28. ↑ rhythm section seven lecture by Bernhard Lypp: "Imagination spaces of art" 1/2, 2/2. Recorded on YouTube. On the relationship between the regressive and progressive view of art. Retrieved March 14, 2016.
  29. ↑ Otto Möller's biography. Gallery Nierendorf. Berlin. Entry on the website of Galerie Nierendorf, Berlin. Retrieved March 18, 2016.
  30. ^ Walter Passarge: Kunsthalle Mannheim. Directory of the painting collection. The art gallery from 1933 - 1955. Edited by Ernst Fuchs. Mannheim 1957. On the Rijksmuseum Research Library website. Retrieved March 20, 2016.
  31. ^ Exhibition preview of the Kunsthalle Mannheim. Dix / Beckmann: The Myth of the World. November 22, 2013 - March 23, 2014. ( Memento of the original from March 25, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Entry on the website of the Kunsthalle Mannheim. Retrieved March 20, 2016. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.kunsthalle-mannheim.de
  32. ^ Exhibition preview of the Kunsthalle Mannheim. The cool look: graphics of the new objectivity. June 12 - September 6, 2015. ( Memento of the original from March 25, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Entry on the website of the Kunsthalle Mannheim. Retrieved March 20, 2016. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.kunsthalle-mannheim.de
  33. ↑ Hans-Jürgen Buderer: New Objectivity. Images in search of reality. Figurative painting of the twenties. Ed. And with a foreword by Manfred Fath. Exhibition cat. Municipal art gallery Mannheim 1994/1995. Munich, New York 1994 ( ISBN 3-7913-1379-7 ). In: Exhibition directory. P. 234. PDF. See also the bibliography here. Retrieved March 21, 2016.
  34. ^ Peter W. Ragge: Retired, but committed. Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen: Zeughaus director Buderer retired / succession clarified. Archive article from Saturday, January 31, 2015. Report on the Rhein-Neckar news portal. Retrieved March 21, 2016.
  35. ↑ Karoline Hille: Traces of Modernity. The Mannheimer Kunsthalle from 1918 to 1933. Dissertation Berlin 1993, Berlin 1994. Entry upon entry on the online portal of the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek. German National Library. http://www.dnb.de . Retrieved March 21, 2016.
  36. ^ Venice, Museo Correr. new objectivity. modern german art in the weimar republic 1919 - 1933. May 1 - August 30, 2015. Exhibition discussion. On the itsliquid website . Retrieved March 20, 2016.
  37. ^ Travis Diehl: New Objectivity. Los Angeles Museum of Art. (Translated by Michael Müller). In: frieze d / e NO. 23. Spring / Spring. Contemporary art and culture in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Contemporary Art and Culture in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, pp. 112–115. On the art magazine website. Retrieved March 20, 2016.
  38. ^ Lenbachhaus - New Objectivity. Retrieved April 10, 2019 .