OBERLIN, OH.-—The Allen Memorial Art Museum (AMAM) at Oberlin College is pleased to present "To Make Things Visible": Art in the Shadow of World War I, on view through June 7, 2009, in the museum's South Ambulatory Gallery.

In the aftermath of World War I, a younger generation of artists followed a new path of social criticism in powerful explorations of the brutality of war. Artists such as Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Otto Dix, and George Grosz sought to communicate a deeper understanding of the world around them. They explored a wide range of themes—portraiture, cityscapes, the circus or variety-hall, and religious imagery—in an attempt to make sense of the changes brought about by world conflict.

Kirchner's 1915 painting Self-Portrait as a Soldier and four powerful self-portraits by Max Beckmann serve as the focal point of this exhibition of primarily drawings and prints dating from about 1910 to 1925. The emotional drama and psychological intensity of the works on view—underscored by Kirchner's disturbing vision of himself as a soldier with his painting hand chopped off—suggests the increasingly varied ways artists sought to express the human condition.

Also on view are early Symbolist and Jugendstil explorations by Edvard Munch, Wassily Kandinsky, and Gustav Klimt, alongside highly expressive graphic works—some of them direct responses to World War I—by German artists Erich Heckel, Max Pechstein, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, and Käthe Kollwitz.

This exhibition is organized in conjunction with a conference—"The Unfinished Business of War and Revolution: Europe, 1918-1919"—sponsored by Oberlin College's Department of History. Fifteen leading European and North American specialists on World War I and its aftermath will present papers on broad themes, including legacies of the war, the transformation of international law and society, the movement of peoples, and narratives of revolution. The conference will take place on Friday-Saturday, March 13-14, 9:30 am-4:30 pm, in Wilder 112 on the Oberlin College campus, with a closing reception held at the AMAM on Saturday, March 14, at 5:30 pm.

On Friday, March 13, at 4:30 pm, a concert featuring music of the World War I era will be held in Kulas Recital Hall at the Oberlin Conservatory. Oberlin Conservatory faculty and students will perform works by Berg, Schoenberg, Debussy, Ravel, Britten, and Stravinsky.

This exhibition, curated by Abbe Schriber (OC '09) and AMAM Director Stephanie Wiles, was organized in conjunction with Leonard V. Smith and Annemarie Sammartino, Department of History, Oberlin College. Support for the development of this exhibition was provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.