The Parents (Die Eltern)
1922/1923
Medium
woodcut
Classification
Portfolio
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Rosenwald Collection
Accession Number
1943.3.9436
Art Historical Context
Käthe Kollwitz'sThe Parents (Die Eltern)*, created between 1922 and 1923, is a poignant woodcut from her seminal series *War (Krieg)*, which reflects the profound grief of World War I's aftermath. Kollwitz, a leading German Expressionist, drew from personal tragedy—her son Peter was killed in 1914—to capture the universal anguish of bereaved parents. Rendered in stark black and white, the image shows a mother and father huddled in despair, their forms merging into a monumental, almost sculptural mass that embodies collective mourning in post-war Weimar Germany, a time of economic ruin and soci...
About the Artist
Käthe Kollwitz
Käthe Kollwitz (1867–1945) was a German artist whose powerful images of poverty, war, and maternal grief established her as the foremost practitioner of socially engaged art in early 20th-century Europe. Working primarily in printmaking—including etching, lithography, and woodcut—as well as drawing and sculpture, Kollwitz created works of raw emotional power that gave voice to the suffering of wor...