About the artist:

Max Klinger (1857-1920), German graphic artist, painter and sculptor, was born and worked in Leipzig, but from time to time he also lived in Brussels, Paris, Munich, Berlin and Rome. He studied graphic technique during a few years in the 1870's for Karl von Gussow, in Karlsruhe and Berlin. Gussow, who at this time had acquired the epithet "Germany's most daring painter", was appreciated for his genre-paintings. It is possible that Klinger was influenced by his teacher, not only in technique but also regarding the anecdotal content of the tableau-like pictorial world that characterized genre-painting. Klinger's virtuosity is often emphasized, his skill including not just one but a mix of several techniques. And his style is realistic and fantastic to such an extent that his etchings and engravings - not surprisingly - appealed to both symbolists and surrealists. He influenced artists as different as Edvard Munch and Max Ernst. Giorgio de Chirico admired Klinger for his special sensibility, as being one "who sees clearly into the past, into the present and into himself." Klinger was also a painter, but he believed that color images required a realism more freed from commentary, while etchings were more fit to express feelings and fantasies. In total Klinger made 16 serials, containing altogether 325 engravings. Among the most famous is, for instance, "Vom Tode", divided into two parts. Part II (1898-1909) contains the nightmarish vision "Plague" (Pest). The picture at the top of this page is taken from "Eve and the Future" (Eva und die Zukunft, 1880), and it is titled "First Future" (Erste Zukunft). It is cropped to a considerable degree here.