print
- Museum number
- 1983,1001.37
- Title
- Object: Berliner Strasse in Dresden
- Description
-
View looking along street of four-storey houses. 1909
Lithograph
- Production date
- 1909
- Dimensions
-
Height: 400 millimetres
-
Width: 335 millimetres (approx)
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Text from Frances Carey and Antony Griffiths, 'The Print in Germany 1880-1933', BM 1984, no.95
This lithograph was one of three prints by Schmidt-Rottluff which were distributed to the passive members of the Brücke in the fourth portfolio in 1909; the woodcut cover of the portfolio was cut by Kirchner. It is therefore appropriate that its subject should be the street in Dresden where the members had their studios; Kirchner was at number 60, while Heckel's studio at number 65 served as the group's meeting place and address for correspondence. The street lay in the suburb of Friedrichstadt, and Heckel's father, as a railway employee, had a tied house at one end. It took its name from the Berliner Bahnhof on one side, which served as the station for trains to Berlin before the construction of the Grossbahnhof in 1893-8. The large houses on it were built at the end of the nineteenth century, with shops on their ground floors and flats above; but after the opening of the main station, and because the south side of the road was never built on, there was never enough trade to maintain a business. For this reason Heckel was able to rent the shop spaces very cheaply as studios for himself and his friends. (See Walter Henn in 'Die Künstlergruppe Brücke... Verzeichnis der Bestände, Kunstmuseum Hannover mit Sammlung Sprengel', Hanover 1982, p. 19; see also Georg Reinhardt, 'Brücke-Archiv' 9/10, 1977/8, p. 34). For the other prints in the portfolio, see 1984,0609.6.
This print is an example of the developed manner of Brücke lithography which Schmidt-Rottluff had adopted from Kirchner and Heckel (See Carey & Griffiths 1984, p.32) in which turpentine is used to break down the tones and give a more unified 'over-all' texture.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
1984/5 Sept.-Jan., BM, 'The Print in Germany 1880-1933', no. 95
- Acquisition date
- 1983
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1983,1001.37
