1932, Otto Dix, War (Triptych) [Der Krieg (Triptychon)] -- Albertinum (Dresden)

From the museum label:

 

The First World War (1914-1918) radically changed not only society and the economy, but also the art scene in Germany. From 1920 Otto Dix broke with Expressionist experiments in form and colour, adopting instead an sarcastic and critical realism ("Woman with Child", 1921), which -- in the disillusionment of the post-war period -- was considered to constitute a "Neue Sachlichkeit" (New Objectivity).

 

Ten years after the end of the war, Dix counterposed the idealised memorials that were customary at the time with his triptych design, whose refined style and drastic intensity are reminiscent of Old German painting. For four years the painter worked on this large-scale, harrowing composition, which points to the constantly recurring cycle of soldiers setting out for war and the reaping of total destruction -- probably the only masterpiece of the period to do so with such shocking realism.

 

The artistic ideas of Otto Dix exerted a powerful influence on younger artists -- the Dresden painters Wilhelm Lachnit, Hans Grundig, and Curt Querner developed their own forms of sensitive and committed realism, which incorporated social criticism.

Done