Berlin Blog #2

The prospect of venturing out by myself in Berlin did make me nervous because of my lack of a sense of direction. After realizing that the train line I needed was shut down for repairs and then going way out of my way, I finally made it to the street I needed. After walking three blocks in the wrong direction before turning around, I finally found my destination, the Käthe-Kollwitz Museum.
I had wanted to visit this museum for several reasons. I've admired other pieces of hers that I've seen in other art museums. Another reason why I wanted to visit this museum is because it is very rare for an entire museum to be dedicated to a female artist, especially one who devoted her work to working class subjects, women, and children. I felt the need to pay respect to her work. Perhaps the main reason I chose this museum to see is because the work of Käthe Kollwitz corresponds and tells much about the history of Germany.
While her work at the beginning of her career focuses on women and children and the relationship between the two groups, as Kollwitz experienced the pain that war brings, her work began to focus on much darker subjects. After losing her son during World War I, Käthe Kollwitz expressed her pain by producing works featuring the subjects of war, including Death, starving children, and the dark hollow eyes of the people around her. Her works are deeply emotional, and they work to protest violence and war.
The museum featured four floors of her work, from the beginning to the end of her career. It displayed a wide variety of her prints, drawings, and sculptures. The room that spoke to me the most was one filled with her self-portraits, ranging from her earliest when she was young, to the ones she made right before she was about to die. The only one that features a happy expression is one that she created when she was a young artist. The rest show the solemn expression of a person haunted by death and the loss of her son and later grandson to war. Kollwitz died in 1945 before the end of the war that she protested strongly against with her work and actions. However, instead of being defeated with the chaos around her, she used it to produce great artwork even after her work was banned from galleries by the Nazis. Her works continue to show us today what she lived through and remain a powerful statement against war and violence.