"(Miners)-Gefangene, Music Horend)" by Kathe Kollwitz.  Lithograph, 1920's/1930's. Good condition, some minor handling creases within the image. (22in x 15 3/4in sheet, 25in x 19in frame)

German printmaker and sculptor. Influenced by the prints of Max Klinger, Kollwitz was indebted stylistically to naturalism, but her preferred subject-matter was linked to the emerging workers’ movement. Her prints on themes of social comment were carried out predominantly in black and white. she devoted herself to this form and gave up painting after 1890.   Abandoning natural surroundings, she concentrated on different ways of representing the human body.   Abandoning natural surroundings, she concentrated on different ways of representing the human body.  The themes were explored not only in her prints and drawings but also in her sculpture throughout her life. Hands and faces served her as vehicles of feelings, with bodies for the most part concealed beneath shapeless articles of clothing.  During the Weimar Republic (1919–33) Kollwitz was very successful.  In 1932 she participated in a petitionary action against the Nazis. As a result of this act of political commitment, after Adolf Hitler’s accession to power in 1933 she was asked to leave the academy, and at the same time she lost her studio. Her work was included in exhibitions in Berlin and Munich in 1934 and 1935 but after that the state made it difficult for her to exhibit.  Although a large portion of her work was stored in cellars, many of them were still lost when her house was destroyed in November 1943.