- WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. (AP)
- The images of Adolf Hitler's Third Reich forever will be linked with
evil. The menace of the swastika, the perfect but intimidating columns
of marching Nazi soldiers.
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- An exhibit at Williams College Museum of Art argues that
it wasn't a study of warfare, politics and military strategy that influenced
the background and symbols for Hitler's visions. It was art: Wagner's operas;
the dark and simple work of German painters; Viennese architecture.
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- "Prelude to a Nightmare: Art, Politics, and Hitler's
Early Years in Vienna 1906-1913'' traces the dictator's artistic aspirations,
disappointments and influences during his seven years in the Austrian city.
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- The exhibit uses about 275 paintings, posters and clips
of film from Nazi rallies to illustrate art's influence on Hitler. Displays
of anti-Semitic pamphlets that circulated around Vienna in the early 1900s
show that Hitler mimicked the pamphlets for his own propaganda decades
later.
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- Two years after visiting Vienna for the first time, Hitler
moved there in 1908 as a 19-year-old aspiring artist. Twice rejected from
the city's art academy, he drifted, staying in homeless shelters, attending
operas and watching sessions of Parliament.
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- A friend encouraged him to sell his paintings - mostly
postcards and watercolors of Vienna landscapes - some of which are displayed
in the Williams exhibit. According to a memoir kept by the friend and on
display at the exhibit, some of Hitler's highest paying and most loyal
customers were Jews.
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- His work never rose to critical acclaim.
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- "He was known for copying from other images,'' said
Deborah Rothschild, the curator who organized the Williams exhibit. "He
had no originality.''
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- While living the life of a struggling artist, Hitler
was drawn to the politics of the pan-German party, a right-wing, anti-Semitic
group that promoted the so-called superiority of an Aryan race.
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- The artwork embraced by the pan-Germans - folksy paintings
that asserted German dominance - was among Hitler's favorite. He railed
against modern art. As Fuhrer, Hitler staged an art show of "degenerate
art,'' comparing works by artists such as van Gogh and Picasso to images
of human deformity.
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- The Williams exhibit, mostly strung together with pieces
on loan from museums in Vienna, shows original works and reproductions
of the art to which Hitler responded. There are the images he loved - like
the painting of drunken monks by Eduard von Grutzner - and those he loathed,
including a self-portrait of Vincent van Gogh.
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- "His taste was very conservative,'' Rothschild said.
"He had an ideal of what art should be, and he hated what didn't fit
that ideal.''
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- Above all, Hitler seemed to have an obsession with opera
- most notably the work of Richard Wagner. It was in Wagner's operas, anti-Semitic
politics and pro-German writings that Hitler began forming the groundwork
- both aesthetic and philosophical - for his Third Reich, according to
the exhibit.
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- "He loved Wagner,'' Rothschild said. "He loved
the timing, the presentation and the design.''
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- Wagner's set designer, Alfred Roller, had an obvious
influence on Hitler.
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- "Prelude to a Nightmare'' juxtaposes scenes from
Wagner's operas against photos of rallies orchestrated by the dictator.
A painting of Roller's set design for "Rienzi'' shows smoke and fire
rising from Rome's capitol. The image is displayed next to a photograph
of a Nazi night rally held in 1934 with smoke and fire set against large
buildings. A set design from "Parsifal,'' with imposing, high arches
and thick columns, mirrors an image of a swearing-in ceremony for Hitler's
body guards.
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- "You look at this, and you see where Hitler got
some of his ideas,'' said Sherwin Fink, a business owner from Hillsdale,
N.Y., who visited the exhibit Tuesday. "It gives a different perspective
on someone we know a lot about.''
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- Rothschild designed the exhibit, which runs through Oct.
27, as part of a project highlighting art from Vienna being sponsored by
11 Berkshire galleries and museums.
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- "As a college museum, I wanted something that would
be a catalyst for thinking and discussion,'' she said. "I wanted to
give people something to talk about.''
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- About 21,000 people have visited the exhibit since it
opened in July, but Rothschild said despite the turnout, there are no plans
to put it on tour.
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- On the Net http://www.williams.edu/WCMA/
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