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Käthe Kollwitz

Study for Unemployed; verso: Self-Portrait and Standing Woman, ca. 1910

Description

Maker

Title

Study for Unemployed; verso: Self-Portrait and Standing Woman

Year

ca. 1910

Medium

Gouache and ink on grey paper; verso: graphite on grey paper

Materials/Techniques

Materials

Techniques

Supports

Dimensions

46 x 34.6 cm (18 1/8 x 13 5/8 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Signed in pencil in LR:Kathe Kollwitz

Type

Credit

Mary B. Jackson Fund

Object Number

62.113

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Facing Artists

February 27 - July 31, 2009

In this sketchy, contemplative drawing, Käthe Kollwitz, for whom self-portraits were a mainstay, concentrated on her face and hands. Kollwitz studied Albrecht Dürer’s compositions of hands at Berlin’s Kupferstichkabinett (Cabinet of Prints and Drawings) and was fascinated by their expressive qualities throughout her life. “Only the total attitude and the face and hands speak to me,” she wrote in her journal in 1919. On the edge of this page is a quick study of one of the working-class women Kollwitz also so often depicted.

Dreams and Nightmares

November 5, 2004 - January 23, 2005

In 1923, Germany experienced a terrifying economic inflation. Vast numbers of workers were unemployed and their families starving. The recto of this sheet has a preparatory drawing for the woodcut Unemployed, one of three in the series The Proletariat, published in 1925. Working from dark to light tones, Kollwitz brought out the despair and hunger experienced by millions. The artist may have been thriftily reusing a sheet from an earlier drawing. The verso reveals a contemplative self-portrait and a quick study of one of the working-class women Kollwitz so often depicted.

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The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in Copyright. This object is Study for Unemployed; verso: Self-Portrait and Standing Woman with the accession number of 62.113. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.