Modernist Aesthetics in Transition: Visual Culture of the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany

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Deborah Ascher Barnstone (University of Sydney, Australia) Donna West Brett (University of Sydney, Australia)

Modernist Aesthetics in Transition

Visual Culture of the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany

Deborah Ascher Barnstone (University of Sydney, Australia), Donna West Brett (University of Sydney, Australia)

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English

Bloomsbury Visual Arts
01 May 2025

Series: Visual Cultures and German Contexts

How did German aesthetic values change during the Weimar Republic and after its immediate collapse at the beginning of the National Socialist period? Contrary to conventional narratives that depict modernist aesthetics as static, shaping principles of modern art and design, this volume argues for their complexity and ever-shifting nature.

Illuminating the vital exchanges that occurred across multiple art forms during a period of unmatched cultural activity, this multi-disciplinary volume explores the cultural transition between Weimar- and National Socialist-era Germany and offers a fresh perspective on the fate of modernism during a time of censorship and social stigma. Featuring essays on architecture, painting, photography, film, sculpture, cabaret, typography, and commercial design, the volume explores competing and comparable themes across German art from 1919-1945 and addresses how modern approaches like New Vision coexisted with more traditional and established artistic modes.

Such visual complexity is evident from the volume’s eclectic coverage: these include ‘sexology’ and eroticism, visual grammar in typography and architecture, the reception of Weimar art in the National Socialist period, and the formation and transformation of queer and Jewish identities. The volume encompasses subjects as different as shadow in the animated films of Lotte Reininger, filmic adaptations of Heinrich Zille’s social commentary in the 1920s, the photography of László Moholy-Nagy, and depictions of female sexuality in Magnus Hirschfeld’s oeuvre. By bridging multiple artistic fields, this highly interdisciplinary work provides a fresh perspective on the ever-changing art and aesthetic principles of early-20th-century Germany.

Edited by: Deborah Ascher Barnstone (University of Sydney Australia), Donna West Brett (University of Sydney, Australia)
Imprint: Bloomsbury Visual Arts
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 236mm, Width: 158mm, Spine: 22mm
Weight: 789g
ISBN: 9781350442528
ISBN 10: 1350442526
Series: Visual Cultures and German Contexts
Pages: 304
Publication Date: 01 May 2025
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

List of Illustrations Introduction 1. Shadow Schein and Scherenschnitte: Lotte Reiniger and the Silhouettes of Early Weimar, Erin Maynes (Los Angeles County Museum of Art, USA) 2. Cinema of the Underprivileged: Heinrich Zille’s Influence on Weimar Street Film, Andréas-Benjamin Seyfert (UCLA, USA) 3. Moholy-Nagy: Shadows and Space-Time, Donna West Brett (The University of Sydney, Australia) 4. Female Sexuality, Sex Research and the Visual Arts, Birgit Lang and Eliza Coyle (The University of Melbourne, Australia) 5. In Pursuit of Beauty: Manassé and Erotic Photography in the Weimar and Nazi Eras, Camilla Smith (University of Birmingham, UK) 6. Visual Diversity within Gleichschaltung? The Diffusion of ‘New Typography’ during the Interwar Period in Germany, Patrick Rössler (University of Erfurt, Germany) 7. The Case of Color in 1920s and 1930s German Architecture, Deborah Ascher Barnstone (The University of Sydney, Australia) 8. Altars to Ambition: The Triptych Revival in Late Weimar and National Socialist Germany, Peter Chametzky (University of South Carolina, USA) 9. Cabaret in Transition: Ilse Bois’ Parodies Between the Times and Between the Genres, Mila Ganeva (Miami University, USA) 10. The Case of Breker: Sculpture Reception, 1919 – 1943, Nina Lübbren (Anglia Ruskin University, UK) 11. Flamboyantly Gay, Jewish and Avant-garde: Alfred Flecthheim’s Dealing with Transitional Aesthetics, Transsexualities and Antisemitism, Fae Brauer (University of East London Centre for Cultural Research, UK) Index

Deborah Ascher Barnstone is Professor and Head of Architecture at the University of Sydney, Australia. She is co-editor of the Visual Cultures and German Contexts series. Donna West Brett is Associate Professor and Chair of Art History at the University of Sydney, Australia. She is author of Photography and Place: Seeing and Not Seeing Germany After 1945 (2016); and co-editor with Natalya Lusty of Photography and Ontology: Unsettling Images (2019).

Reviews for Modernist Aesthetics in Transition: Visual Culture of the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany

Uniting leading scholars in the Weimar avant-garde and Nazi modernism, this timely collection helps us better understand the continuities as much as the disruptions between the periods’ aesthetic styles and schools. Such precise analyses of celebrated works and forgotten resistance require us to challenge many long-held assumptions about artists caught in turbulent political times. * Randall Halle, Klaus Jonas Professor of German Film and Cultural Studies, University of Pittsburgh, USA * This marvellous anthology counters conventional wisdom that cultural production in the Weimar and Nazi eras was either traditional and conservative or radically modernist. A must-read for all scholars of German history and visual culture in the 1920s and 1930s, it proves that there were often significant aesthetic overlaps between old and new forms of art in these turbulent times. * Maria Makela, Professor Emerita of History of Art and Visual Culture, California College of the Arts, USA * Germany’s transition from the Weimar Republic to National Socialism is too often posited as a total break with the past. With its stellar contributions from a global cast of scholars, this book offers a new narrative through outstanding, in-depth case studies drawn from diverse spheres including art, architecture, film, sculpture, cabaret, erotic photography, and colour theory. * Elizabeth Otto, Professor, Modern and Contemporary Art History, The University at Buffalo, USA *