Existing comment:
(51) Nude figures astride an ornate building, ca. 1910.
Pen, ink, ink, wash and watercolor.
Art Wood Collection of Cartoon and Caricature
Prints and Photographs Division
LC-DIG-ppmsca-03337 (51)
In a surrealistic watercolor by German artist Heinrich Kley (1863-1945), three nude figures, a young woman, a grotesque younger man, and an older man, are astride an ornate civic building, which they dwarf. The artist's grotesque transformation probably represents a commentary on German politics and government. Kley began as a painter of conventional, realistic subjects, notably including scenes of industry. He also used his dazzling drawing technique and unconstrained imagination to produce inspired drawings of human-animal hybrids and biting cartoons that were published in two popular German magazines Simplicissimus and Jugend. |