Straßenszene 1935

Editor: This is "Straßenszene," or "Street Scene," by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, created in 1935. It's a drawing held here at the Städel Museum. I’m immediately struck by how the seemingly simple lines manage to create a feeling of…unease, maybe? What do you make of it? Curator: Unease, yes, that’s a brilliant observation. I think Kirchner's use of line – so frantic, yet precise – beautifully encapsulates the fractured experience of urban life, especially in interwar Germany. The figures seem trapped within this… cage, really. It feels to me as though there are layers here that almost feel like psychological mapping, wouldn't you agree? Editor: A cage, yes, I see that now. But what's the significance of this... fragmented style? Is it just an aesthetic choice? Curator: Not at all! For Kirchner, an Expressionist, it’s deeply intertwined with emotion and experience. Remember the historical context: anxieties about modernity, war, societal decay. His jagged lines mirror that disruption. They ARE the feeling. Editor: So, the city itself is a kind of psychological space? Curator: Precisely. Kirchner isn’t just drawing a street, he’s portraying a state of mind, how a modern man percieves himself as just an object of society . Consider the harsh, angular forms—they lack traditional beauty, perhaps, but express raw truth, or what he considered truth. What do you think about their faces? What can they be interpreted as, beyond simply existing on paper? Editor: Well, they definitely don't look very happy. Haunted, maybe? It’s fascinating how a few lines can evoke so much feeling. Curator: Absolutely. That’s the power of Expressionism. I always found the ghost figures the most intruiging thing within these types of images. They feel out of place but strangely a piece of the same puzzle. Editor: So much to think about, it is amazing. I’ll never look at a simple cityscape the same way again! Curator: Exactly, it’s about reading between the lines… literally!