Berlin Street

George Grosz American, born Germany

Not on view

In Berlin Street, Grosz depicts several menacing denizens of Berlin against the backdrop of the modern metropolis, a hellish place animated by greed, cruelty, and ghoulish lust. A beggar, one of the two million crippled World War I veterans who roamed the streets of Berlin, sits on the lower left and holds up his hat to a woman, whose garish attire and crude make-up suggest that she is most likely a prostitute. The palette of grays, browns, and blacks further emphasizes the grit and grime of city life. Distorted, soulless automatons, the figures appear as slaves to capitalistic decadence.

Berlin Street, George Grosz (American (born Germany), Berlin 1893–1959 Berlin), Oil on canvas

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