The value of art nazi
Although the goal is far from glorifying nazism, the first exhibition of the Design of the Third Reich, with photos of Adolf Hitler, posters, costumes, copies of “Mein Kampf” and flags with swastikas, are raised blisters in the Netherlands, and the sensitivity of the topic has forced the museum to strengthen security .
from a list Of possible exhibitions on political movements of the TWENTIETH century, the Museum of Design in ‘ s-hertogenbosch is stuck with the “ideology more evil”: the national socialism spent “a lot of interest and ambition to the culture” to set the foundation visual of your identity , explains the director of this museum, Timo de Rijk.
“they Were interested in all kinds of ideas that will help them to be submitted, the propaganda, the architecture . We knew that it was a touchy subject , but we are a museum and we treat matters of History with a vision appropriate. What is interesting is that we realized that stole and appropriated all “, he adds.
The exhibition makes a complete tour of the design used by the nazis, which includes propaganda posters and election-with images of Hitler taken by his photographer, Heinrich Hoffmann, uniforms, helmets, ceramic tableware, furniture, documents on techniques of propaganda, paintings and even a Volkswagen Beetle , the famous “beetle”, which carries the stamp Hitler .
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One of the first pieces that get to the public is the figure of a bronze “Der Wager” , developed by Arno Brejer, the sculptor favorite of Hitler . It was designed as part of a group of five statues to decorate the building of the Chancellery in Berlin, and reflects Greek and roman culture with which the nazis wanted to be associated.
Ideal nazis
A few steps away is located “Portrait of a Family” , a box painted in 1938 by artist Hans Schmitz-Wiedenbrueck , and it was conceived as propaganda of the points of view of national socialists on the purity of race and popular culture , because it illustrates the perfect nazi of a white family with many children.
“Portrait of a family”, by Hans Schmitz-Wiedenbrueck
The painting, which was the opening of Germany at the Venice Biennale in 1940, it also highlights the taste of nazis by farmer aryan apparently, “authentic”, with rural roots, and leads a life considered to be simple, something that is reflected in the box with the furniture modesto, wild flowers and a pitcher of German beer.
What more abundant in this sample are the posters , as the writer of books of biology, Alfred Vogel, who also served as director of the primary school during the Third Reich.
These posters are content, racist and anti-semitic , in the guise of lessons on natural heritage and offspring, were used to categorize people in races , depending on their physical appearance: “were Intended to show that the jews and slavs were inferior to the germans in appearance, character, health and physical culture”, explains the Dutch museum.
In the showcases, presents a number of copies of different sizes of “Mein Kampf” (“My Struggle” written by Hitler), among them the editing braille , which was only published in the early days of the Third Reich, until the nazis they decided that since there was no place society for the people with disabilities .
On the wall, the museum has placed the symbols that the nazis used to identify to the different groups of prisoners held in its concentration camps: a triangle green to criminals , brown to gipsy , is red to political prisoners , pink to gay , and the jews were one yellow or a star .
The Communist Movement of the Youth of the Netherlands (CJB) and the ex-combatants of the resistance of Dutch anti-fascists (AFVN) have been carried out concentrations in front of the museum to protest against the initiative, claiming that “glorifies nazism”.
A group of extreme right came to r behind the exhibit , what is seen by opponents as a confirmation of their fears that it “legitimizes” the nazi ideology.
The situation, which has also been reflected with complaints in social networks, has forced the gallery to reinforce security for fear of riots by hiring triple the amount of surveillance personnel, and has forbidden to take photos of the pieces on display.