The objectivist
Staging the world as a play
"It is my wish to come very close, strikingly close, to the times in which we live, without submitting to artistic dogma...I need the connection to the world of senses, the courage to portray ugliness, life as it comes." - Otto Dix
In the 1920s, Otto Dix was the artist of Neue Sachlichkeit, the New Objectivity, par excellence. Painting in a very realistic, almost photographic style, he chose as subjects the poverty, violence, death, and war that he experienced as a soldier in World War I. After this terrible experience, he painted the famous triptych The War.
Dix staged the world as a play, a grotesque farce. But the form he chose to do so was based on the classical canon of beauty. Dix lived his life and served art, for he adhered to the age-old rule that the American painter Ad Reinhardt put in a nutshell: "Life is life, and art is art."
In the 1920s, Otto Dix was the artist of Neue Sachlichkeit, the New Objectivity, par excellence. Painting in a very realistic, almost photographic style, he chose as subjects the poverty, violence, death, and war that he experienced as a soldier in World War I. After this terrible experience, he painted the famous triptych The War.
Dix staged the world as a play, a grotesque farce. But the form he chose to do so was based on the classical canon of beauty. Dix lived his life and served art, for he adhered to the age-old rule that the American painter Ad Reinhardt put in a nutshell: "Life is life, and art is art."
The author:
Eva Karcher has been working in journalism for the past 15 years, specialising in contemporary arts. She regularly writes for magazines and newspapers including Vogue, Focus, Bunte, AD, SZ, Die Zeit, and Der Tagesspiegel. She has published several books, and developed new magazine concepts for artinvestor and sleek, for example. She also curates exhibitions and is an art consultant for galleries, companies and private collectors.
Eva Karcher has been working in journalism for the past 15 years, specialising in contemporary arts. She regularly writes for magazines and newspapers including Vogue, Focus, Bunte, AD, SZ, Die Zeit, and Der Tagesspiegel. She has published several books, and developed new magazine concepts for artinvestor and sleek, for example. She also curates exhibitions and is an art consultant for galleries, companies and private collectors.
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TASCHEN 25
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