Master study no. 1
pm-12-july'26
To begin this series of biographies I have chosen to study the life and work of Käthe Kolowitz, my biggest artist crush. Kathe Kolowitz (pronounced like Kay-tee, not Ka-th) is a legend, both in skill and subject matter.
I drool over this artist both for her expressive handling of the human figure, her linework and use of light, and her political commentary. In an art world dominated by men, Kolowitz centred women and the working class, protesting war and oppression, and made intimate and piercing self-portraits. Thats why she was a legend.
Kollowitz's style was naturalistic, an unusual choice in the birth of the era of abstraction, but one which fit her motives; to capture the stark realities of poverty, war, and loss. Working in etchings, sculpture, and later, lithography and woodcuts, Kolowitz's style was a frenzied network of lines, exquisitely detailed etchings of faces and forms weathered by hardship, peering luminously out of a nebulous darkness. Over time, her visual language simplified, and she utilised increasing distortions of figure, the characteristic dilation of hands, hunching of figures, provoking atmospheres of grief, fragility, anguish.
In 1918, the first World War began, and Kolowitz's 18 year old son, Peter, enlisted in the army. Again, Kolowitz's life was fractured by loss when Peter was killed in action as a volunteer in Belgium, that same year. This event triggered a depression which would haunt the rest of Kolowitz's life. Kathe at that time became a staunch pacifist, and used her art in protest of war. Strangely, years prior, in 1903, Kolowitz had drawn a piece called "woman with dead child", using her son Peter and herself as models in front of a mirror. Peter was seven at the time. According to her older child, Hans, Kathe "thought she foresaw Peter's death even then, and had been crying when working on the images".
In 1927, Kathe had been a part of many exhibitions and was widely recognised in the art world for her accomplishments. However, in 1933, the national socialist regime was taking root in Germany, and nazi party authorities forced her to resign from the national academy of arts in Berlin, despite many appeals. She was banned from selling her art, exhibitions were cancelled, and her work removed from galleries. Kolowitz continued to work regardless, producing her last major cycle of lithographs. The death of her brother-in-law in 1934 may have triggered this final series. This series follows a variety of figures, predominantly women and children, at different stages of life. My favourite pieces in this series, death seizes a woman, shows the violent and sudden nature of death, and death on the road, a gentle and vulnerable portrayal of grief. In "death is recognised as a friend", a man embraces death, as if a long-awaited release. Call of death shows death touching the shoulder of a self portrait of the artist, who cranes towards it, as if letting go or accepting her death. The series depicts the many varied experiences of death, as a violent intruder, or a welcome and long-awaited friend.
In 1936, the Nazi takeover was ramping up. The Gestapo visited her home and threatened to arrest and deport her family to a concentration camp. Any remaining displayed works by Kolowitz were confiscated, and sold, or exchanged. The artist continued to display her works in her studio and sell art to buyers in the United States. Her health declined, as did her output. One of her last works was a lithograph called "seeds for sowing should not be milled". In her diary she wrote on the piece... "I have decided to take up the same theme.... This is now my legacy. Seeds for sowing should not be milled... Boys, proper Berlin boys, who greedily scent the air outside like young horses, are held back by a woman. The woman (an old woman) has wrapped the boys into her protective mantle, spreading her arms and hands over them in a violent and domineering gesture. Seeds for sowing must not be ground, this demand is not a sentimental yearning but a command, a demand."
Kolowitz died on April 22nd, only days away from the end of the war, in 1945, aged 77. Her legacy, indeed is one of maternal love and staunch protective spirit towards the sacredness of human life. She humanised the working class, showing the courage and dignity in their plight towards freedom from oppression. She laid bare the deepest depths of the human condition, providing catharsis. And she did so with impeccable style and skill, hence her legendary status. the end
I drool over this artist both for her expressive handling of the human figure, her linework and use of light, and her political commentary. In an art world dominated by men, Kolowitz centred women and the working class, protesting war and oppression, and made intimate and piercing self-portraits. Thats why she was a legend.
Read more
Kathe Kolowitz was born in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia) in 1867 to a middle class family of 7 children. Her father was a socialist democrat, and her grandfather was a pastor and socialist, so she pretty much hit the jackpot, family-wise. Her family's political views had a life-long impact on her art and education. Her life was struck by tragedy when her younger brother died during childhood, an event which afflicted her with anxiety, and a neurological disorder called Alice in wonderland syndrome. Alice in Wonderland syndrome (or dysmetropsia) causes distorted perceptions of vision and other senses, causing the body and surrounding objects to appear to shrink or grow in size. Some have theorised about the influence of this disorder on Kolowitz's human forms, which were sometimes depicted with enlarged heads and hands. She studied art from the age of 12, then moved onto the Berlin Women's school of art, where a community of women encouraged her exploration of motherhood, social disparity, and the human condition. In Munich, when she was 17, Kathe was introduced to her future husband, and medical student, Mr Karl Kollowitz, and they tied the knot 5 years later. Karl, by this time a doctor, tended to the poor in their Berlin apartment where Kathe also ran her studio. She found inspiration in these interactions with the working class, laying the groundwork for a lifelong dedication to social commentary and change. She stated..."The motifs I was able to select from this milieu (the workers' lives) offered me, in a simple and forthright way, what I discovered to be beautiful.... People from the bourgeois sphere were altogether without appeal or interest. All middle-class life seemed pedantic to me. On the other hand, I felt the proletariat had guts. It was not until much later...when I got to know the women who would come to my husband for help, and incidentally also to me, that I was powerfully moved by the fate of the proletariat and everything connected with its way of life.... But what I would like to emphasize once more is that compassion and commiseration were at first of very little importance in attracting me to the representation of proletarian life; what mattered was simply that I found it beautiful."In the Weavers revolt series, produced from 1893 to 1897, Kathe captured the resilience, dignity, and oppression of the working class, inspired by the 1844 Silesian weavers uprising. This was a prominent historical labour movement, predominantly run by women who protested low wages and abysmal working conditions. The series follows a narrative, beginning with a woman bent over a dying child. In the second piece, death comes to take a mother who is framed by a child and father. An upturned bowl may be a motif for death from starvation. In the third piece, titled Conspiracy, the workers conspire to revolt, hunched in darkness in the corner of a room. In the fourth, the weavers march with scyths, with hollow faces and hunched figures. In the centre of the scene, a woman carries a child sleeping. The series ends with a room full of dead workers, another body being carried in to be laid amongst them. A widow grieving over the bodies. Soldiers have been deployed to suppress the uprising.
Kollowitz's style was naturalistic, an unusual choice in the birth of the era of abstraction, but one which fit her motives; to capture the stark realities of poverty, war, and loss. Working in etchings, sculpture, and later, lithography and woodcuts, Kolowitz's style was a frenzied network of lines, exquisitely detailed etchings of faces and forms weathered by hardship, peering luminously out of a nebulous darkness. Over time, her visual language simplified, and she utilised increasing distortions of figure, the characteristic dilation of hands, hunching of figures, provoking atmospheres of grief, fragility, anguish.
In 1918, the first World War began, and Kolowitz's 18 year old son, Peter, enlisted in the army. Again, Kolowitz's life was fractured by loss when Peter was killed in action as a volunteer in Belgium, that same year. This event triggered a depression which would haunt the rest of Kolowitz's life. Kathe at that time became a staunch pacifist, and used her art in protest of war. Strangely, years prior, in 1903, Kolowitz had drawn a piece called "woman with dead child", using her son Peter and herself as models in front of a mirror. Peter was seven at the time. According to her older child, Hans, Kathe "thought she foresaw Peter's death even then, and had been crying when working on the images".
In 1927, Kathe had been a part of many exhibitions and was widely recognised in the art world for her accomplishments. However, in 1933, the national socialist regime was taking root in Germany, and nazi party authorities forced her to resign from the national academy of arts in Berlin, despite many appeals. She was banned from selling her art, exhibitions were cancelled, and her work removed from galleries. Kolowitz continued to work regardless, producing her last major cycle of lithographs. The death of her brother-in-law in 1934 may have triggered this final series. This series follows a variety of figures, predominantly women and children, at different stages of life. My favourite pieces in this series, death seizes a woman, shows the violent and sudden nature of death, and death on the road, a gentle and vulnerable portrayal of grief. In "death is recognised as a friend", a man embraces death, as if a long-awaited release. Call of death shows death touching the shoulder of a self portrait of the artist, who cranes towards it, as if letting go or accepting her death. The series depicts the many varied experiences of death, as a violent intruder, or a welcome and long-awaited friend.
In 1936, the Nazi takeover was ramping up. The Gestapo visited her home and threatened to arrest and deport her family to a concentration camp. Any remaining displayed works by Kolowitz were confiscated, and sold, or exchanged. The artist continued to display her works in her studio and sell art to buyers in the United States. Her health declined, as did her output. One of her last works was a lithograph called "seeds for sowing should not be milled". In her diary she wrote on the piece... "I have decided to take up the same theme.... This is now my legacy. Seeds for sowing should not be milled... Boys, proper Berlin boys, who greedily scent the air outside like young horses, are held back by a woman. The woman (an old woman) has wrapped the boys into her protective mantle, spreading her arms and hands over them in a violent and domineering gesture. Seeds for sowing must not be ground, this demand is not a sentimental yearning but a command, a demand."
Kolowitz died on April 22nd, only days away from the end of the war, in 1945, aged 77. Her legacy, indeed is one of maternal love and staunch protective spirit towards the sacredness of human life. She humanised the working class, showing the courage and dignity in their plight towards freedom from oppression. She laid bare the deepest depths of the human condition, providing catharsis. And she did so with impeccable style and skill, hence her legendary status. the end
>Oblongmelon
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