Impassioned Images:
German Expressionist Prints

Exhibition Statement

The Schneider Museum of Art was pleased to exhibit a fine selection of prints from the collection of Syracuse University. The pieces presented offer a rare opportunity to explore the cultural and social perspectives that were reflected in German printmaking produced at the beginning of the twentieth century. As we moved closer to the twenty-first century, the exhibition compared the themes and the political statements represented in these prints with those of contemporary artists at the time.

A distinct style of printmaking emerged in Germany at the turn of the twentieth century. Direct and powerfully expressive in their concept, these images evoke sentiments of alienation, despair, and injustice. Politically and morally instigative, the prints of the German Expressionists may be linked stylistically with other art movements of the period, but the message these artists intended tran­scends place and time. Often considered the prophets of doom and gloom, the social, religious, and historical events of the first half of the twentieth century have given much credibility to their perceptions of sig­nificant moral or spiritual crisis which exist in the modern world.

In order to convey their highly charged and evocative senti­ments graphically, many of the artists chose the direct and forceful medium of the woodcut. Often appearing unsophisticated or primitive in their manner, the success of these prints relies heavily on com­positional virtuosity and a technical mastery of the medium. The apparent inconsistencies of scale and contours, diagonal lines which plunge across the pictorial plane, and the natural surface details of the wood block give these prints an intensity well suited to the artist’s message.

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