Exposing a Nazi:
The exhibition destroying a myth

For Fulda, one of the most startling discoveries was the depth of anti-Semitic feeling that Nolde developed from the late 1920s onwards.

“He came to see himself as both the victim and foremost challenger of Jewish dominance in the German art scene.”

“Seeing how this intensified from the 1930s to the early 1940s was shocking because the estate always denied there was any sign Nolde was an anti-Semite. Coming to face-to-face with documents which showed he not only harboured these feelings but wrote this into his unique selling point, was astonishing.”

The researchers found spine-chilling evidence in Nolde’s correspondence and autobiographical writings. The same year that he denounced Pechstein to Goebbels’ Propaganda Ministry, he sought to convince Hitler of his “ardent commitment”, as Fulda puts it, to the anti-Semitic project by working out a de-jewification plan. Then, in 1943, years into his professional ban, Nolde supported Nazi propaganda labelling the Second World War as a battle against world Jewry.

But after 1945, the Nolde myth allowed Germans to come to terms with their recent past and feel proud again, Fulda explains. “He offered a redeeming cultural legacy, a way of demonstrating to the world that not everything that came out of that period was horrible, and that Germans, even great artists, suffered too.”

“People were very fond of the idea of this solitary figure who during his ban secretly produced these wonderful ‘unpainted’ watercolours as an act of resistance against the regime.”

The exhibition features much more archival material than is usually the case but it also reconstructs specific constellations of paintings. Perhaps most significantly, visitors see how Nolde arranged his own painting gallery in the winter of 1941-2, shortly after he received his professional ban.

“This was the moment when most people assume he fell out with National Socialism but he saw this ban as entirely compatible with his self-narrative of the misunderstood artistic genius ahead of his time.”

“The extent to which Nolde embraced anti-Semitism and used it to set him apart from ordinary German artists is a new discovery and it shocks many visitors to the exhibition.”

The Nolde Foundation has taken the revelations on the chin. Dr Ring recently told the media: “We … no longer see any reason to protect Nolde from himself. His art, which was pioneering for expressionism and modernism, is strong enough to withstand the discussion about his relationship with Nazism.”

Remarkably, Fulda is the first historian to co-curate an exhibition at the Nationalgalerie and he has concerns about the way in which artists and their work are usually presented to the public.

“Curators set out to present the most brilliant artwork without necessarily questioning why these artworks exist in the first place. They draw tactically on historical context when it’s felt necessary but they try to keep text to a minimum. By contrast, our exhibition analyses why certain works exist, who made the key decisions and on what grounds, and why this aura around the artist was constructed.”

“We often build simplistic hero narratives around artists and turn them into a brand. Instead, we should see them as a gateway into a period that shaped their output.”

The exhibition continues to provoke strong opinions among visitors. Security staff have reported that the space is much noisier than normal.

“We don’t tell visitors what they should make of these artworks”, says Fulda. “Many visitors find that disorientating, which is the whole point. Some feel there is a helpful division between the artwork and the artist’s biography, that their aesthetic enjoyment of the art is protected. But others realise that these artworks are cultural artefacts, that they are loaded with meaning and the authorial intention affects why they exist.”

For visitors born in the 1940s and early 50s, the experience is more troubling, Fulda senses. “They thought their critical attitude to Germany’s past and admiration for Nolde set them apart from their parents’ generation and put them on the right side of history. Some now feel they’ve been ‘hoodwinked’, to quote one visitor, and even that they are being accused of living a lie. That’s not our intention but that’s how they feel.”

“A minority deplore the extent to which a younger generation, who didn’t experience the war, feel they can pass judgment on the artist and the caretakers of the Nolde legend. But most seem to welcome our critical reflection on myth-making.

“The exhibition presents Nolde as the master of violent clashing colour and it’s impossible not to react to that, one way or another”, Fulda reflects. “Some people not attuned to German Expressionism might find themselves sharing Hitler’s opinion that his paintings are “shit”. These paintings still arouse very strong emotions and remind us how political regimes can abuse art’s power.”

Emil Nolde: A German Legend. The Artist during the Third Reich closes on 15 September 2019

You can explore some of the exhibition with this film (interviews in German)