(Dedicated to my dear Karl Maria Weber.)
By Franz M. Jansen.

The question imposes itself irresistibly: Why are the same names always mentioned—Dürer, Grünewald—and not Cranach, Altdorfer, Stefan Lochner, Holbein? Why always Fra Angelico and not Filippo Lippi? Why Botticelli, not Ghirlandaio, Giorgione, Perugino? Why Rembrandt, not Frans Hals? Why Leonardo and Michelangelo again and again, before Raphael, Murillo, Velázquez (the list does not claim to be complete)—and yet, above our marriage beds, only swooning Murillos and Raphael’s Sistine Madonna look down from heaven; in our parlors, Giorgione’s Concert (never a Fra Angelico), more likely the Madonna in the Rose Bower or some other Cologne master than Grünewald’s Madonna of Colmar; more likely a Holbein portrait than Dürer’s melancholic self-portrait with the dramatic curls; an endless sweetness from Steinle, etc.; more likely Schwind, Böcklin than Marées or Rethel appear around us.

The answer is:

The works of Dürer, Botticelli, Rembrandt, Leonardo, Michelangelo do not describe; they do not enumerate or feel their way around life—they are life, frightfully intensified. They are merciless declarations about humanity; sudden assaults of the essential; they make judgments; they emerge from total devotion and demand devotion; yes, these works are and demand upheaval, bring revolution—how, then, could they possibly fit into our homes, which are built upon routine, pleasure, satiation, immobility, and comfortable habit (they are supposedly too large in format. After all, every room must have its 15½ pictures, each canceling out the other—heaven forbid there be one dominant, towering image—the “great” painting!).

And yet, the epochs of history, the course of time, the masses have always singled out these names, passed them on, surrounded them with a special resonance, a sacredness, and a reverent silence. These names are again and again affirmed, made more mysterious. The masses (and almost only the masses—individuals immediately fall back) have an infallible sense for merciless self-surrender, for blazing confession, for grandeur without grandiloquence (even if it is only the fleeting grandeur of a political orator, of a heroic tenor). Potentiation, concentration subjugates them. Only the masses truly collapse, lose themselves, forget individual concerns, individual desires, and commit to self-abandonment. Only within the masses do the barriers between person and person fall—and with that, all the preconditions for a proper relationship to art are fulfilled!

These paintings are not parlor-room pictures. True, we have tried to make them acceptable for the salon by reducing them in size, by rendering them “cute,” but their life is so tightly bound to the usually large, external form into which they were born, that when reduced, they become dead, colorful objects. Reduction and transposition—two mortal sins! These works devour the whole human being: Grünewald’s Crucifixion in Colmar, Michelangelo’s frescoes—they shatter, torment everything; Fra Angelico’s frescoes in the monastic cells of Florence lift one into a heavenly levitation, into a celestial mendicancy; Dürer’s Apostles, his self-portrait—who can endure them beside themselves, violet-blue lyricism living? Leonardo’s Last Supper in a tearoom, among Bruno Paul furniture, with aesthete-chatter and Chopin-dancing—(even his little Madonna Lisa already has that… that well-known unpleasant, supposedly indefinable smile.)

Leonardo’s highest demand ever made: the synthesis of spirit and nature, a god-parallel creation and created. —

In these works, formal problems disappear; the “artist” disappears—only the human remains, the brother, the flaming fellow human being.

Let this be stated in advance.

Also stated in advance: even the wildest, most eccentric form of Expressionism (the explanation for this will follow) is, in its entire structure, a salon painting, a disguised Impressionism (salon painting equals Impressionism). Unconsciously, however, it prepares the task: the creation of a new ornament—away from the acanthus; the creation of a new perspective.

The word: Expressionism is here; today it means everything that meets resistance; today it is only a word—what matters is to transform it into a clear concept.

Expressionism:

1st Group: The search for the representation of space, for a form of spatiality—Cubism—and the search for unheard-of experience, for adventure, for unheard-of form for this unheard-of content—Futurism.

2nd Group: The search for the human being, for content, for impact upon life—Activism.

These two, oppositional groups have been indiscriminately pressed together; that is why the image of today’s art is so confusing, seemingly ungraspable, like Babel; they are the strongest opposites, a bridge between them is impossible.

It becomes immediately apparent that the orientation of the first group remained the same as in Impressionism: experience, the cult of the ego; and since it remained the same, the result (since one wants and must set oneself apart) is the demand for something never-before-seen, unheard-of, formally and egotistically unbelievable — Impressionist epigones of the worst kind.

Each younger generation—not even that: each younger individual—necessarily outdoes the previous one, not because he is better, but because he is “newer”; that is inevitable.

In almost all magazines, by all art writers today, this group and its formal problems are endlessly trampled out. From this springs forth these all-commentators, these all-understanders, these chameleons who can adapt to anything—that is their element, and only that. These people have never collapsed before a work; they defend themselves against it with the brazenness of a pimp. For such people it must be said (freely after Wersel): Whoever has never seen a work before which they could collapse, whoever has never collapsed before a work, has never seen art, never understood art.

This first group, this form-expressionism, is closely connected with 5 o'clock tea; aestheticism; Poiret ladies; dialectics; with chiseled, cleverly witty debates (a typical confusion of cleverness with spirit). —

Inserted question: How can a true work—that is, one of the highest things that a human being has placed as something fixed into the fleeing stream of faces, dreams, goals above themselves—how can such a thing become the object of a discussion? A terrible misuse! — Either one rejects it, as being not in accord with one’s own deepest humanity, or one surrenders oneself to it. — But discussion—and then walking away with the satisfaction of having put oneself splendidly on display…!

A new pale Rococo is here. Parallels arise: Just as once there were the delicate, sweet, Madonna-variants of the Cologne masters, of the Master of Siena; just as later there were the erotic pastoral love-scenes, the garter stories of Watteau, Fragonard, Boucher, etc.—so today: form-expressionism—playthings, life-weak, impotent elements, too weak to make a statement.

Yes, let us not deceive ourselves: Rococo is here. (Incidentally: a striking parallel between Rococo wallpaper patterns and today’s book covers, etc., etc.—ornamentalization of the landscape!) Depth and spirit are just as frowned upon now as once were deep feeling and simple coitus (as even earlier: true heavenly surrender and sacred mendicancy, before which sweet, bodiless and libido-less Cologne Madonnas knelt pious, satiated patrician ladies). Refinement is trump; intellectual eroticism in place of Louis XV sexual eroticism—at least that was still healthier. Intellectual lust!

Picture Titles: (Their Parallels).

1. Form-expressionist: Angular Forms Overarched by Roundness, The Birth of the Leaf, Star-Forming, Work No. 11, Woodcut No. 14, etc.

2. Impressionist: City in the Evening, The Same at Noon, Mr. Reger from the Front, Nude with Blue Bathing Trunks, House with Red Roof, etc.

Statements are not made; what triumphs is the artist, the refined, nerve-driven man hovering above all elements and materials (which he has never actually possessed); everything becomes sensation to him, everything adventure.

This art no longer exists for us; it is to be struck off. This art with its damnable attitude: I, the artist (in the best case: I, the human being). This infinitely complicated, delicate artist, for whom a mosquito bite already counts as a disturbance, as pain—what an irresponsible misuse of those exalted words: pain, suffering, struggle, death, etc.—let him disappear.

In contrast, let this be our motto: We human beings—We renounce the name artist, but we want to be human, we want to be brothers, responsible beings with total devotion to life (Cézanne or van Gogh). Van Gogh—a surrendered one—to painting and to every act, from his Bible-worthy letters (large edition, please!) this leaps forth all the more strongly—demanding ethical effect. Van Gogh, lay preacher and painter of greyness in the misery of the Borinage, Michelangelesque affirmer, a caller to life, to light, to vastness in the southern sun, to the color-exuberance of Arles.

The division of the groups has now become fully clear, principles have laid themselves bare; the seemingly ungraspable, multi-directional nature of the "most modern" art has been filtered. The unbridgeability of the two groups is so stark that the word Expressionism can no longer be applied to both.

Good works already exist; let them be gathered together (an attempt at this): Munch: The Kiss, The Sick Girl; Hodler: The Great Hour, The Weary of Life; Schinnerer: The Dreamed Couple; Jäckel: After the Birth; Beckmann, etchings: The Operation, The Shell 2c; Kokoschka: his portraits; Barlach: The Star-Gazer 2c.

The striving for content, for transcription (painting is the energetically charged act of writing down—let this be brought back to mind and not forgotten: it is a simple act of notation—this simple fact has been completely concealed by "artistry")—this transcription of demands, insights, and the will to do so, has awakened, and through the war has been made immeasurably focused and goal-oriented. People exist now who are full of their time. In magnificent truth: a new generation is here, a new breed for whom being an artist means nothing, and being human means everything. Already the word "new Nazarene-ism" is dropped—
but trust in this: to be immediately and effectively connected to life through these hard times, entirely apart from world-fleeing, cloister-dwelling, church-blinders-attached “intimate” contemplation, which makes those older pictures and people seem so childishly unnecessary. We also know ourselves to be in full possession of the most earthly sensuality—a catastrophic lack among those others—a raging sensuality, above all toward our materials: the colors and inks, the canvases and walls, the etching needles that cut sharply and ardently through the metal.

In literature, Dehmel, Hasenclever, Hiller, Rubiner, von Unruh, Wersel raise the same cry: away from Erlebnis, from l’art pour l’art. Characteristic book titles: Two People, Friends of Man, The New Breed, Man in the Middle, Man is Good, Death and Resurrection.
All these paintings and books aim at inner upheaval, are flaming arrows into the hearts and minds of fellow human beings. Full of the times! Painting has long enough been a snob's affair, auction commodity; away with these exhibitions of 15,000 paintings, these art fairgrounds, stimulus parlors. Let there be once again things before which one must learn reverence, must fall silent—instead of making oneself miserable and tourist-like by talking them to death. Works must again cry out: Human being, stand still! The deepest in you is revealed here, accuses you, wants to exalt you!

Let us also point out the fateful confusion between drive-to-act, the haste of industry, and the drive-to-create. The dreadful overestimation of industry (the hum of machines, “operations,” mistaken for life) will subside now, as a mighty creative force, true life, begins to overflow.

Yes, path and goal have become lightning-clear in these four terrible years. Much has been buried: both spiritual and technical. Tradition—spiritual and technical—has been interrupted. Much is to be made up. Therefore, for now: create with crude means, relentlessly and the relentless. Means that aim at differentiated experience, that are refined and prepared, are not suited to us; what matters is to speak out plainly. What demands to be "written down" has heaped itself up unnaturally, too much "to-be-said" has accumulated, which for now must simply be said, once and for all. A colossal burden, a heavy volume of form-seeking substance is there, through which only rough, rapid seizing can lead the way. Form—both inward and outward—will be summary, condensed, unsentimental; there can be no consideration, no soothing details. A host of "dear" art tricks, infallible methods (both academic and “most modern”), must be cleared away. Brutality, clarity, universal comprehensibility of the pornographic drawings in public urinals—this is the demand! For now: wedge-like forward-storming. We are still far from Leonardoesque nearness to God, Jehovah-likeness, cosmic totality—(and that’s fine).

Of course, in their condensed transcription, with their deeply anchored, sharply staked-out demands (without direct tradition), these works must at first provoke resistance—the well-known resistance to the unvarnished, “raw” truth. People will call these pictures incomprehensible; but let no one confuse their incomprehensibility, or throw them once again into the same pot as the “true” incomprehensibility of the first group.

Characteristic of these new works is also the larger external format, which will continue to grow. There will arise works before which people will stand still (and be halted) as before a cliff-face—towering, laden with human screams, agitated, stormlike, prophetically written down. The time is ripe for a new Michelangelo, for a new Last Judgment.

Before we come to the final question, let us make one thing clear again: 1. It can no longer be said: What a marvelous color the evening sky has! Or: The yellow evening sky gives me the idea of something elegant.— Away with this dreadful I, I, I. 2. Let us admit, finally, that Defreggerism and Impressionism (i.e., Form-Expressionism) are twin brothers, that intimate points of contact exist: Tavern stories for the beer table; Sensitive nonsense for the Bruno Paul salon. Ten Defreggers etc. side by side, a collection of flung-together Impressionist paintings, a room of wildest Form-Expressionists—together: how tepid, how trivial it all is;
the same ode, tameness, quietude; one collapses from boredom.

The most important question remains: Can works be created that compel even the resistant to at least stand still, and compel every like-minded soul into a state of devoted resonance? If not—then art is prostitution, unnecessary—better to grow potatoes.

Since it was possible—since there were the Dantes, Cervantes, Shakespeares, Schillers, the Michelangelos, Leonardos, Grünewalds, Grecos, etc.—since they were the innermost, fiercely burning cores of their time, since they are torches of humanity—then it must be possible today too—more so than ever. For the war has “educated” a generation: volcanic, full of potential, eager to pour itself out.

The general level, the possibility of resonance, is there (was always there—just never so strong, so visible). The “mass”, lit up by the will for a shared goal beyond the everyday, a goal into which it can lose and forget itself, so that for minutes at least, it might feel itself as brothers—that is: paradisiacal. Everything prepared it for this: the people’s assemblies, the gift-giving, the overflowing joy and offerings around the Zeppelin, those August days of 1914.

Let us therefore prepare ourselves. Away with all life-wisdom! The pain of our fellow human being must be our deepest shock,
every death our end of the world, the death of our neighbor must make us unrecognizable.

A tremendous, unredeemed, because unshaped, mass of life-moments cries out to us; let us throw ourselves in, headfirst, without hesitation, without retreat. We withdrew from the “crude” life, moaned about delicacy, allowed bad politicians, bombastic demagogues to play their games on our fellow citizens—can we be surprised, then, that their words now count for more?

We are guilty of damnable omission! We are placed in an endless stream of humanity, we are surrounded by fruitless sorrow and joy, by a ravenous urge for life. We have shown the terrible uniqueness of life, of the fact that we live “invariably under death,” and have transformed it into an explosion of strength, of this-worldliness, of fraternity!

We, who have shuddered at the terrible simultaneity in and around us, we, who have glimpsed something of the horror of the final second—we have done our duty! A kind of art that compels everyone—it exists!

Naturally, people will—of course, we expect it—attribute to us every possible motive, except genuine conviction. They will call us immature, youthful. We can bear that. But the devil take us if we ourselves, one day, recant, call “ideal” what are merely the most ordinary self-evident things, used up, lived-out.