German expressionist painter Max Beckmann, whose paintings were influenced by horrific scenes he witnessed as a medical orderly in World War I, was eventually labeled a "degenerate artist" by the Nazis and forced to flee his homeland. In this collection of essays, speeches, and letters, Beckmann emerges as a deeply intelligent and sensitive observer of the world. Of particular note are writings from the battlefields of 1915, and some of his instructional comments to students from his time spent teaching in the United States in the late 1940s.


The New York Times Book Review, Andrea Barnet
The man who emerges from this revealing selection from his earliest diaries, war letters and public statements is duplicitous and more politically compromised than has been previously known--yet also more interesting.


From Kirkus Reviews
This first English edition of Beckmann's writings offers a selection of documents illuminating the life and work of the German painter and graphic artist. Beckmann (18841950) belonged to the revolutionary generation of German Expressionist artists who achieved prominence around the time of the First World War. His paintings and drawings frequently take the brutality and cruelty of that war as a principal theme, to which Beckmann brings his signature sense of flattened space, grotesque form, and coarse vitality. Editor Copeland Buenger (Art History/Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison) includes excerpts from Beckmann's diaries and letters as well as some complete exhibition statements, brief essays and speeches, and two short dramas. The word, however, was not this master's native element. Even so, the editor and her co-translator make the most of what they have found in the German archives. Certainly anyone interested in Beckmann will want to refer to such documents as his statement ``On My Painting.'' It dates from 1938, not long after the Nazis had staged their notorious exhibition against ``degenerate art'' in Munich. Beckmann was included among the ``degenerates.'' Curiously, though, he has nothing to say about it. The artist thought of himself as unpolitical. He was more interested in what he regarded as the spiritual and the eternal in art. ``Color, as the strange and magnificent expression of the inscrutable spectrum of Eternity, is beautiful and important to me as a painter; I use it to enrich the canvas and to probe more deeply into the object.'' This kind of nebulous blather is characteristic of Beckmann, who--as the editor notes in her extensive (and quite helpful) annotations--read the arcane ramblings of Madame Blavatsky as avidly as he read serious philosophers. Surprisingly, and regrettably, this book has only a few illustrations. Still, it should prove to be a useful resource for aficionados and students of modernist art. (10 halftones, 8 maps, not seen) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Book Description
One of the most important German artists of the twentieth century, Max Beckmann is known for the depth and sensuous force of his works, but little is known about his personal life. Self-Portrait in Words reveals Beckmann's experience of life from the first years of his career in Berlin and Paris through his final years in the United States. This collection of Beckmann's writings serves as a companion to his art and a testament to the complexities of his life.

"Barbara Copeland Buenger . . . has done an excellent job of editing and annotating Beckmann's voluminous private and public writings."--Andrea Barnet, New York Times Book Review




Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German

FROM THE PUBLISHER

One of the most important German artists of the twentieth century, Max Beckmann was labeled a "degenerate artist" by the Nazis and chose exile. His artistic production encompassed the realism and figural themes of his early works to the provocatively blunt portraiture, critical urban views, and richly layered symbolic works for which he is now universally recognized. Although he was a prolific writer, his written work has never before been collected and translated into English. Beckmann is known for the depth, pungency, and tremendous sensuous force of his works; only in the last twenty years have we come to learn more about his personal life. Self-Portrait in Words maps out Beckmann's life and draws attention to the occasions on or for which he produced his writings, to the importance writing had for him as a form of expression, and to both the contemporary and personal references of his ideas and images.

FROM THE CRITICS

Kirkus Reviews

This first English edition of Beckmann's writings offers a selection of documents illuminating the life and work of the German painter and graphic artist.

Beckmann (18841950) belonged to the revolutionary generation of German Expressionist artists who achieved prominence around the time of the First World War. His paintings and drawings frequently take the brutality and cruelty of that war as a principal theme, to which Beckmann brings his signature sense of flattened space, grotesque form, and coarse vitality. Editor Copeland Buenger (Art History/Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison) includes excerpts from Beckmann's diaries and letters as well as some complete exhibition statements, brief essays and speeches, and two short dramas. The word, however, was not this master's native element. Even so, the editor and her co-translator make the most of what they have found in the German archives. Certainly anyone interested in Beckmann will want to refer to such documents as his statement "On My Painting." It dates from 1938, not long after the Nazis had staged their notorious exhibition against "degenerate art" in Munich. Beckmann was included among the "degenerates." Curiously, though, he has nothing to say about it. The artist thought of himself as unpolitical. He was more interested in what he regarded as the spiritual and the eternal in art. "Color, as the strange and magnificent expression of the inscrutable spectrum of Eternity, is beautiful and important to me as a painter; I use it to enrich the canvas and to probe more deeply into the object." This kind of nebulous blather is characteristic of Beckmann, who—as the editor notes in her extensive (and quite helpful) annotations—read the arcane ramblings of Madame Blavatsky as avidly as he read serious philosophers. Surprisingly, and regrettably, this book has only a few illustrations.

Still, it should prove to be a useful resource for aficionados and students of modernist art.