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I must mention he was not predominantly homosexual; he drew a lot of women too.
Wotruba retreated to ever more kubistic, non figurative work
as the years went on and National Socialism's thought grew ever more dominant these styles had to go underground, as they were considered degenerate and "jewish" art.to the right here Schiele's Sebastian as a poster for his exhibition in 1915
below a self portrait
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 I must fit these two brothers in:
They were not active in visual arts
but their writing has remained inspirational for many artists and works till this day.
below left we see Heinrich, who wrote the book shown left,
which later was the blueprint for the film that catapulted Marlène Dietrich's carreer
as a dike icon with her masculine attitude in "Der Blaue Engel"
Right below is Thomas Mann,
original writer of the book on unanswered gay love "Death in Venice"
that we all got to know through Visconti's film version |
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Thomas fled Germany in 1936 and through te war years supported resistance with talks in German on the BBC
Von Stuck was instrumental and examplary in setting up a true Freikörperkultur way of working;
he held a very open studio in München and often had the press present while working with male models
National pride , severely dented after WW1 was boosted by glorifying old legend heroism and traditional rural life:
the Nordic and Germanic races grew up much more relaxed and open about the naked body than the Anglo Saxons:
implanting new national values about nature and the beauty of the body could not start early enough:
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What also cannot be omitted here is photography:
early 20th century figurative art remained under serious threat of the new technology of the 19 century,
which many saw as natural follow up of classic painting,
just as these days some see digital art takes its place in some sectors of film/photography,
model drawing and painting.
Most memorable here are the young romantic English artists
that were drawn to the relaxed gay and physical cultural climate
of Germany between the 2 wars:
most photos here are by Herbert List
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The 2 rare drawings above cannot be excluded.
They come from an Austrian gay pre-war illustrated article about youth fantasies and experiences in the Wandervogel youth camps.
This Wandervogel organisation, originally a-political and comparable to the boyscouts was later on completely encapsulated and taken over by the Hitlerjugend.
and indeed it worked:
It may look corney now, but these drills did forge allegiance untill an untimely but heroic death:
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not only masters at posterdesign
dressdesign was taken just as serious
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Nazi uniforms were very cleverly styled and designed to have special erotic attraction not pitched to women,
but to men, which kept them popular with skinheads, in gay culture and as partydress to this day.
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Once in the forces, not all was as nice as it had seemed. Certainly the SA section of his forces under Röhm romantisized men-comradery. Their celebration of the naked body went sofar that it could no longer be camouflaged and was exposed as being nothing but homosexual. All was efficiently "ausgerottet" through rivalling, and much more "manly" SS forces.
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Also see Visconti's the damned (trailer with commercial and some more trailers in the package).
The Germans had the great luck of being nominated to stage the Olympics in 1936
even more lucky that the official Nazi Party cineaste, Leni Riefenstahl indeed had enormous talent!
In my darkroomdiaries summer 2004 issue, I presented the case
that the olympics have not been presented more openminded and uninhibited as in her production ever since.
especially the games in Athens, where they originated, made no effort at all in this field.
the ancient games were conducted with completely naked athletes,
the opening and closing ceremonies were a great disappointment in this aspect.
the 'Briefmarken' below appear courtesy of Martin of Holland, incredible source of resources; indispensable when it comes to any kind of collection . . .
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Let's return somewhat again to homo-sensitive evidence
in german public sculpture and architecture:
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| I'm not saying all the 3rd Reich produced was great, it is just what got out of these repressive and violent days more or less officially and survived.
Art has no conscience; I do not believe that, but still, I'm not complaining that the Nazi's placed nude males back in the sunlight. Here's an overview with work that remained of architect Speer and sculpturists Breker and Thorak.
for those who cant get enough: on summer 2002's edition of my darkroomdiaries is an illustrated report of my trip around the statues of Berlin and Potzdam
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here are a few more images that bring across the immense dimensions of these works
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| both these artists were tried after WWII, but were acquitted and only sentensed to not practice their profession anymore. These sentenses were lifted ten years later allowing at least Breker to go on where he left off. He managed as before the war to get all the top German athletes to pose for him. He died in 1991 
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That's almost enough attention for the nazi period.
For more imagery I must refer to detailed studies within the masterclass,
like the page on nazi sculpture.
Let's try to end with some of the more critical images
they obviously only showed up at the very end of the era:
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Because the painting on the left played an important role during the German occupation of the Netherlands it was acquired by the Rijksmuseum in may 2007. 'De Nieuwe Mensch' was made by Henri van de Velde (1896-1969). It idealises the Nazi ideology and was used for the glorifying of the Dutch partyleader Anton Mussert. The main figure can be seen as Mussert himself. The 2,30 m high en 1,75 m wide painting was hung in his private office at party headquarters in Utrecht.
After the liberation of Holland in '45 the painting was lost untill it resurfaced in 2003 in Belgium.
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let's end this theme with these cartoons. I doubt they really imply Adolf was queer |  |
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| A last work by George Gross, made in 1944 called "Cain or Hitler in hell"
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Hans Zank, * 1889 Berlin † 1967 Falkensee
