Max Beckmann

Between 1915 and 1923, Beckmann established his leitmotifs and loaded them with enough associations and echoes to serve him as idea carriers for the next three decades. Some of these he used as fixed hieroglyphs; others, such as the fish and the cat, are fully fledged characters in his Great World Theater. Mrs. Battenberg's cat Titti appears harmlessly in 1915, as a play kitten, as a mysterious witness to the foolish hustle and bustle of humanity, as a predatory demon she constantly reappears until she finally haunts the late triptychs. Beckmann remained faithful to his motifs. Rattling gramophone funnels, fancifully swinging musical instruments and banal lyre boxes provide the background music from 1920 to 1950. Candles are often depicted, one burning proudly upright next to an overturned one that has given up the ghost and the flame. A ladder sometimes leads to the attic, sometimes directly to heaven. Masks enigmatically conceal many a face. These modern leitmotifs were later joined by some romantic ones: swords, helmets and knights' armor, harps, spears and marble busts. And with that, Beckmann's formal language was complete - and timeless.

I hate nothing as much as sentimentality. The stronger and more intense my will to hold on to the unspeakable things in life becomes, the heavier and deeper the shock of our existence burns within me, the more closed my mouth becomes, the colder my will to grab hold of this eerily twitching monster of vitality and imprison it in crystal-clear, sharp lines and surfaces, to crush it, to strangle it.