Max Beckmann
1884 -1950
- Painter,draftsman, printmaker, sculptor, and writer.
- Even though he was an expressionist, he rejected both the term and movement as he did
not like to be labeled according to them.
- In the 1920s, he was associated with the New Objectivity, an outgrowth of Expressionism
that opposed its introverted emotionalism.
- Expressionist artists mostly sought to express meaning or emotional experience rather
than physical reality.
- Beckmann probably painted more self-portraits than any other artist and struggled on how
to define himself.
- His art were sober, beautiful and expressive oil paintings, strong in contour and colour.
- He painted subjects from the entertainment world, many portraits of family and friends,
and countless allegorical compositions with characters symbolic of ancient myths.
Still life with three skulls (1945).
Oil on canvas
Oil on canvas
- This painting contains many elements of ‘vanitas’ and ‘memento mori’ paintings which were
fashionable throughout northern Europe in the 17th & 18th centuries.
- Vanitas ~ mostly symbols of skulls, rotting food or fading flowers as a reminder of the
certainty of death.
- Memento mori
~ Latin phrase for " Remember your Mortality"
~ Its a reminder about our death and the judgement that will follow once we are
dead.
- This was painted during the final months of World War 1.
- Combination of modern style of flattened space, schematic forms & intense colour with
traditional still life - objects skulls
- These paintings aimed to show us that life, with its pleasures of the company of friends,fashionable throughout northern Europe in the 17th & 18th centuries.
- Vanitas ~ mostly symbols of skulls, rotting food or fading flowers as a reminder of the
certainty of death.
- Memento mori
~ Latin phrase for " Remember your Mortality"
~ Its a reminder about our death and the judgement that will follow once we are
dead.
- This was painted during the final months of World War 1.
- Combination of modern style of flattened space, schematic forms & intense colour with
traditional still life - objects skulls
card games and drinking, also holds reminders of our own mortality and unavoidable death.
- In this still-life by Beckmann, the skulls and extinguished candle are clearly intended to be
read as symbols of the shortness of life.
- The colour black used captures grim mood and mostly the value used is dark. Colour black
usually is associated with "darkness"
- It appears that the direction of light is from the right side and he uses contrast of light and
darkness in this painting.
- This painting is an abstract that uses symbols as guidance to understand its true meaning.
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