Kathe Kollwitz Quotes

Quotes about:

Art Children War

While I drew, and wept along with the terrified children I was drawing, I really felt the burden I am bearing. I felt that I have no right to withdraw from the responsibility of being an advocate.

Kathe Kollwitz

Children, Responsibility, Drawing

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.96, Northwestern University Press

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It is my duty to voice the sufferings of humankind, the never-ending sufferings heaped mountain high. This is my task, but it is not an easy one to fulfill.

Kathe Kollwitz

Voice, Suffering, Mountain

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Every war carries within it the war which will answer it. Every war is answered by a new war, until everything, everything is smashed.

Kathe Kollwitz

War, Answers, Carrie

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.184, Northwestern University Press

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I was put in this world to change it.

Kathe Kollwitz

Power, World, This World

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Look at life with the eyes of a child.

Kathe Kollwitz

Children, Eye, Looks

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I can always paint very well with my eyes, but with my hands it doesn't always work out.

Kathe Kollwitz

Eye, Hands, Work Out

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I do not want to die... until I have faithfully made the most of my talent and cultivated the seed that was placed in me, until the last small twig has grown.

Kathe Kollwitz

Life, Achievement, Self Improvement

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.64, Northwestern University Press

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I have never been able to carry out any work coolly. On the contrary it is done, so to speak, with my own blood. Anyone who looks at my works must be able to sense that.

Kathe Kollwitz

Blood, Looks, Done

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One day, a new ideal will arise, and there will be an end to all wars. I die convinced of this. It will need much hard work, but it will be achieved The important thing, until that happens, is to hold one's banner high and to struggle Without struggle there is no life.

Kathe Kollwitz

Peace, War, Struggle

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I am in the world to change the world.

Kathe Kollwitz

Life, World, Changing The World

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Old ideas die hard. We've had thousands of years of women having almost no rights. Parts of the world are in a struggle toward very basic human rights for women, and most of the world isn't even there yet. And it's going to take a long time to change these attitudes.

Kathe Kollwitz

Attitude, Struggle, Rights

Source: www.aaa.si.edu

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There are moments on most days when I feel a deep and sincere gratitude, when I sit at the open window, and there is a blue sky or moving clouds.

Kathe Kollwitz

Gratitude, Moving, Clouds

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.129, Northwestern University Press

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My work is not, of course, pure art in the sense that Schmidt-Rottluff's is, but it is art nonetheless... It is all right with me that my work serves a purpose. I want to have an effect on my time, in which human beings are so confused and in need of help.

Kathe Kollwitz

Art, Confused, Needs

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Where do all the women who have watched so carefully over the lives of their beloved ones get the heroism to send them to face the cannon?

Kathe Kollwitz

War, Remembrance, Heroism

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.62, Northwestern University Press

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I thought I was a revolutionary and was only an evolutionary.

Kathe Kollwitz

Revolutionary

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.100, Northwestern University Press

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If all the people who have been hurt by the war were to exclude joy from their lives, it would almost be as if they had died.

Kathe Kollwitz

Hurt, War, People

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.87, Northwestern University Press

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It seems to me nowadays that the most important task for someone who is aging is to spread love and warmth whenever possible.

Kathe Kollwitz

Important, Tasks, Aging

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There must be understanding between the artist and the people. In the best ages of art that has always been the case. Genius can probably run on ahead and seek out new ways. But the good artists who follow after genius — and I count myself among these — have to restore the lost connection once more.

Kathe Kollwitz

Running, Art, People

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.68, Northwestern University Press

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I am afraid of dying-but being dead, oh yes, that to me is often an appealing prospect.

Kathe Kollwitz

Death, Dying

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I have received a commission to make a poster against war. That is a task that makes me happy. Some may say a thousand times that this is not pure art.... but as long as I can work, I want to be effective with my art.

Kathe Kollwitz

Art, War, Long

"Letters of Friendship and Acquaintance" [Briefe der Freundschaft und Begegnungen] edited by Hans Kollwitz, p. 95; cited in "Käthe Kollwitz: Woman and Artist" by Martha Kearns, (p. 172), 1976.

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When Michelangelo was an old man, he drew himself sitting in a child's pushcart.

Kathe Kollwitz

Children, Men, Sitting

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Culture arises only when the individual fulfills his cycle of obligations. If everyone recognizes and fulfills his cycle of obligations, genuineness emerges. The culture of a whole nation can in the final analysis be built upon nothing else.

Kathe Kollwitz

Finals, Analysis, Culture

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The diary and letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, Northwestern Univ Pr

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No longer diverted by other emotions, I work the way a cow grazes.

Kathe Kollwitz

Work, Cows, Way

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.53, Northwestern University Press

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Recently I began reading my old diaries. Back to before the war. Gradually I became very depressed. The reason for that is probably that I wrote only when there were obstacles and halts to the flow of life, seldom when everything was smooth and even. ... As I read I distinctly felt what a half-truth a diary presents.

Kathe Kollwitz

War, Reading, Flow

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.111, Northwestern University Press

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As in everything else, I find that age is not good for much, that one becomes deafer and less sensitive. Also, the higher up the mountain you climb, the less of a view you get. A mist closes in and cheats you of the hoped-for and expected opportunity to see far and wide.

Kathe Kollwitz

Opportunity, Views, Age

Käthe Kollwitz, Hans Kollwitz (1988). “The Diary and Letters of Kaethe Kollwitz”, p.164, Northwestern University Press

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Born: July 8, 1867
Died: April 22, 1945
Occupation: Artist
Cite this Page: Citation

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