The First World War for many German artists was a catalytic experience that changed their work forever. Although Max Beckmann “only” volunteered as medical orderly and unlike e.g. Otto Dix didn’t sit tight in the trenches, the experience initiated a drastic shift in his work: where before Beckmann had dealt with historical topics in a late impressionist idiom that channeled influences from Rembrandt, Goya and early Cézanne, from 1915 onwards his style developed into what he himself coined „transcendental objectivity“, an amalgamation of Expressionism, Cubism and late medieval art. It was a direct reaction to the horrors he was confronted with as medical orderly and followed a nervous breakdown in the same year: biblical scenes, crammed into tight spaces and painted in a flat instead of spatial manner from now on are the new direction in Beckmann’s oeuvre. In brutal, almost nightmarish tableaus classical scenes like „Descent from the Cross“ and „Christ and the Sinner“ Beckmann processed the turmoils of war and the societal upheaval it triggered way beyond the end of the war.
Late last year the Neue Galerie in New York dedicated a comprehensive exhibition to Max Beckmann’s formative years between 1915 and 1925 which was accompanied by the eponymous catalogue published by Prestel. In crisp reproductions it features the paintings, drawings and lithographs presented in the exhibition but also features insightful essays by curator Olaf Peters and others. The former provides an excellent analysis of the artists’ dramatic stylistic changes and his reaction to postwar Germany with a particular focus on the disabled veterans. In the lithographic portfolio „Hell“ from 1919 he depicts the traumatized survivors and takes a biting satirical look on postwar society that also represents a link to his later Circus-themed works.
What both exhibition and catalogue quite plainly show is the incredible urgency contained in Beckmann’s works between 1915 and 1925 and with what radicality he reacted to the fault lines in postwar society. At the same time this period forms the basis for all the later works, one of the many reasons for me to warmly recommended the catalogue!
