Bernhard Heisig
22 Oct 2005 - 29 Jan 2006
Bernhard Heisig
The Fury of Pictures
Exhibition
Venue: Martin-Gropius-Bau
22 October 2005 – 29 January 2006
Organizer: Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen zu Berlin und
Museumspädagogischer Dienst Berlin
Curator: Dr. Eckhart Gillen
Part of Berlin’s theme of “Between War and Peace” for the year 2005 to mark the 60th anniversary of the unconditional surrender, which is under the patronage of Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and the Governing Mayor of Berlin, Klaus Wowereit.
The exhibition gives a comprehensive overview of Bernhard Heisig’s work, which is shaped by the “volunteer’s” wartime memories of the “Battle of Ardennes” and “Fortress Breslau”.
Bernhard Heisig’s personality and work were at the centre of the incessant argument over the assessment of art in the GDR, which began in 1990 and culminated in early 1998 in the debate about furnishing the Reichstag with works of art. People did not want to give any space in the parliament of the united Germany to a former member of the Waffen-SS, who was an official in a ‘criminal regime’. The antipathy towards ‘state artists’, which was popular at that time, impeded the view of a work that broke with the doctrine of Socialist Realism in the GDR in the 1960s, offering pictures of doubt and despair over the physical and mental destruction left behind in Germany by the war.
This exhibition is therefore a central contribution to the “War and Peace” theme of the year, which is being arranged by the Federal Government and the Senate of Berlin to mark the 60th anniversary of the surrender, with numerous exhibitions and events. Heisig never made any secret of the fact that he was a culprit and victim of the times.
His artistic achievement lies in the constant artistic examination of a biography that passed from war and dictatorship to a further dictatorship and the Cold War.
This exhibition and the accompanying catalogue provide information on the life and work of Bernhard Heisig, starting with the question of how he joined the Waffen-SS as an 18-year-old in 1943 and how he battled with the traumas of the war throughout his life, through to the conflicts over “prescribed anti-fascism”, which the SED dictatorship used in an attempt to legitimise itself. His paintings of the Christmas dream of the incorrigible soldier, and of Christ as a soldier refusing to obey orders, illustrate the potential for individual change.
The 71 paintings and 62 graphic works in the exhibition show the most important cycles of his work: they are portraits and scenes from his own experience which still preoccupy him to this day. In constantly renewed combinations and variants, there are basically only three protagonists who appear in his paintings, and the carousel of figures, props and landscapes revolves around them: the figure of the incorrigible soldier, who in some cases assumes a portrait-like resemblance to the painter; the mother, and the son. The most important scene of his pictures is his home town of Breslau, where he had to hold out until 6th May 1945 as a defender of “Fortress Breslau”. In his studio pictures the artist shows himself as a creator besieged by the pictures of his memories that surround
him.
www.zwischen-krieg-und-frieden.de
© Bernhard Heisig: Der Kriegsfreiwillige
Collection Hartwig and Maria-Theresia Piepenbrock, Berlin
The Fury of Pictures
Exhibition
Venue: Martin-Gropius-Bau
22 October 2005 – 29 January 2006
Organizer: Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen zu Berlin und
Museumspädagogischer Dienst Berlin
Curator: Dr. Eckhart Gillen
Part of Berlin’s theme of “Between War and Peace” for the year 2005 to mark the 60th anniversary of the unconditional surrender, which is under the patronage of Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and the Governing Mayor of Berlin, Klaus Wowereit.
The exhibition gives a comprehensive overview of Bernhard Heisig’s work, which is shaped by the “volunteer’s” wartime memories of the “Battle of Ardennes” and “Fortress Breslau”.
Bernhard Heisig’s personality and work were at the centre of the incessant argument over the assessment of art in the GDR, which began in 1990 and culminated in early 1998 in the debate about furnishing the Reichstag with works of art. People did not want to give any space in the parliament of the united Germany to a former member of the Waffen-SS, who was an official in a ‘criminal regime’. The antipathy towards ‘state artists’, which was popular at that time, impeded the view of a work that broke with the doctrine of Socialist Realism in the GDR in the 1960s, offering pictures of doubt and despair over the physical and mental destruction left behind in Germany by the war.
This exhibition is therefore a central contribution to the “War and Peace” theme of the year, which is being arranged by the Federal Government and the Senate of Berlin to mark the 60th anniversary of the surrender, with numerous exhibitions and events. Heisig never made any secret of the fact that he was a culprit and victim of the times.
His artistic achievement lies in the constant artistic examination of a biography that passed from war and dictatorship to a further dictatorship and the Cold War.
This exhibition and the accompanying catalogue provide information on the life and work of Bernhard Heisig, starting with the question of how he joined the Waffen-SS as an 18-year-old in 1943 and how he battled with the traumas of the war throughout his life, through to the conflicts over “prescribed anti-fascism”, which the SED dictatorship used in an attempt to legitimise itself. His paintings of the Christmas dream of the incorrigible soldier, and of Christ as a soldier refusing to obey orders, illustrate the potential for individual change.
The 71 paintings and 62 graphic works in the exhibition show the most important cycles of his work: they are portraits and scenes from his own experience which still preoccupy him to this day. In constantly renewed combinations and variants, there are basically only three protagonists who appear in his paintings, and the carousel of figures, props and landscapes revolves around them: the figure of the incorrigible soldier, who in some cases assumes a portrait-like resemblance to the painter; the mother, and the son. The most important scene of his pictures is his home town of Breslau, where he had to hold out until 6th May 1945 as a defender of “Fortress Breslau”. In his studio pictures the artist shows himself as a creator besieged by the pictures of his memories that surround
him.
www.zwischen-krieg-und-frieden.de
© Bernhard Heisig: Der Kriegsfreiwillige
Collection Hartwig and Maria-Theresia Piepenbrock, Berlin