Entartete Kunst: Führer durch die Austellung - TWO COPIES WITH ORIGINAL ENTRANCE TICKET

Berlin: Verlag fur Kultur und Wirtschaftswerbung. [1937]. Two copies of the original catalogue for the famous exhibition of "degenerate art" staged by the German Reich in 1937-1941, together with an original entrance ticket from the 1939 Vienna exhibition. One copy is a first edition published 1937 and the other a revised edition, published ca. 1938. 8vo. 32 pp. with numerous b/w photographic reproductions. Original pictorial wrappers on both copies. First edition has slight tear to the lower left back cover and overall toning; very good condition overall.  Later edition in fine condition. Both 15 x 21 cm. The original ticket bears the stamp of the Institut für Deutsche Kultur- und Wirtschaftspropaganda, the organizer of the exhibition, and has been ripped on entry. 7 x 3 cm.

In 1937, Germany's Nazi government staged an exhibition in Munich entitled "Entartete Kunst" - the official designation given to all "modern art" which was not classicist or realist in nature. The exhibition was not merely designed to illustrate what the Nazis deemed "bad art," but had a political purpose. "Modern art" was deemed to be part of the overall assault on "German art" and culture by a Bolshevist - and largely Jewish - movement of "artists" who were working in tandem with the Communist movement to destroy German, and Western, civilization. Germany's art museums were scoured for such works, and were declared forfeit to the state. When the exhibition finally closed, this guide book, written by Fritz Kaiser, an official in the Reich Propaganda Ministry, was issued as a souvenir. Shown in the catalogue are works by artists such as Otto Dix, E. L. Kirchner, E. Nolde, K. Schmidt-Rottluff, George Grosz, Paul Klee, and others. Excerpts from speeches by Hitler are printed opposite most of the illustrations. In the second, revised edition, the artist Richard Haizmann is no longer characterized as Jewish, after he lodged a complaint with Hermann Göring. (13192)

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