#Ernst ludwig kirchner brandenburger tor driver

In the small town of Königstein and in the intimate countryside of the Taunus region, Kirchner must have been surprised to find in reality those sharply dropping ground planes and vertically shifting vantage points which he had constructed from imagination in the earlier years'. This expressionistic technique, which was becoming characteristic of Kirchner's style, was particularly successful in the depiction of townscapes, creating a very dynamic, almost abstract vision.Īs Gordon writes, 'Königstein, located in the Taunus Mountains just northwest of Frankfurt, offered hilly vistas with high horizons occasionally interrupted by dominant peaks, which contrasted strongly with the gently rolling landscape common to Saxony and Fehmarn and the flat Brandenburg plain surrounding Berlin. 437), are painted from a strongly distorted perspective: either from a bird's eye view or from below and looking upwards, in both cases shortening the distance. 436, housed in the Folkwang Museum, Essen), and Brandenburger Tor, Berlin (Gordon no. Other townscapes from this period, such as Roter Turm in Halle (Gordon no. It is particularly the conflict between the peaceful, everyday life of the pedestrians in Königstein and the apocalyptic transformations of the city's perspective and cloud configurations'. It is the underlying quest for spirituality which makes the Berlin period so important.By spirituality I do not mean religiousity, nor specifically the Red Church in the painting, but rather a concern with the ultimate limits of materialism and with the ultimate questions of mortal existence. Gordon writes: 'This painting, taken from Kirchner's 'Berlin Period' is historically and ideologically more significant than work from his earlier 'Dresden Period'. In a letter written in 1986 when the painting left the Albright-Knox Gallery, Professor Donald E. His paintings from these years also show a number of developments in style which prefigure his later oeuvre. Although this is a period of small artistic output, the intensity and quality of Kirchner's work was considerably increased. Three times between 19 Kirchner travelled from Berlin to the Kohnstamm sanatorium in Königstein near Frankfurt. There followed various stays in sanatoriums but these failed to cure his nervous condition which was worsened by his fear of forced military conscription.

#Ernst ludwig kirchner brandenburger tor driver

At the outbreak of the First World War, Kirchner volunteered for service as a driver in an artillery regiment, but by 1915 he was sent on sick leave due to a lung infection and general physical and nervous debility.