Akaki zeigt dem Schneider die auszubessernden Stellen (Akaki Shows the Tailor the Areas to be Mended) (plate 3) from Der Mantel (The Coat)
1919
Medium
lithograph from a bound volume with 12 lithographs and one relief print on laid JW Zanders paper
Dimensions
book: 25.8 × 20.4 × 1 cm (10 3/16 × 8 1/16 × 3/8 in.)
Classification
Volume
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Ruth Cole Kainen
Accession Number
2012.92.623.4
Art Historical Context
**Discovering Walter Gramatté's "Akaki Shows the Tailor the Areas to be Mended"** This poignant lithograph, plate 3 from Walter Gramatté's1919 bound volume *Der Mantel (The Coat)*, draws inspiration from Nikolai Gogol's classic 1842 novella *The Overcoat*. It depicts the humble protagonist Akaky Akakievich presenting his threadbare coat to a tailor for repairs—a pivotal moment symbolizing the story's themes of poverty, longing, and human dignity amid St. Petersburg's harsh bureaucracy. Created just after World War I in Germany, Gramatté's series of 12 lithographs and one relief print captures...
About the Artist
Walter Gramatté
Walter Gramatté, born Walter Eduard Gramatté on January 8, 1897, in Berlin-Wedding to building manager Otto Gramatté and his wife Katharina, emerged as a poignant voice in German Expressionism despite a tragically brief career. The son of modest parents—described variably as a baker in some accounts—Gramatté volunteered for World War I in 1914 but was largely spared frontline duty due to chronic p...