Lecture (LEC)

• COLL (CASE) A&H Breadth of Inq

• Above class open to undergraduates only
• Course Topic: Art of the Third Reich and its Aftermath: Between Accommodation and Resistance
• Course meets online synchronously. Some on campus, independent work may be listed in the syllabus. Accommodations for distance learning available.
• COLL (CASE) A&H Breadth of Inquiry credit

Topic: Art of the third reich

Adolph Hitler liked to present himself as the ¿Sculptor of Germany,¿ and this myth of the artist-dictator reflects the extraordinary importance that National Socialism placed on the visual arts. Recent decades have witnessed a burst of interest in this aspect of the so-called Third Reich, while matters of Nazi looting and restitution (the return stolen property to its pre-war owners) have taken center stage in international politics. The intensified examination of Nazism¿s relationship to the arts also responds to a broader search for new ways to theorize the workings of power through cultural and aesthetic practices. At the same time, the Nazi¿s denigration of modernism and especially its infamous 1937 exhibition ¿Degenerate Art¿ has elicited a wide range of scholarship, as does the response by victims and later generations of artists to the Holocaust and the persecution of minority groups. Here, the upcoming exhibition Remembrance and Renewal: American Artists and the Holocaust, 1940¿1970 (Sept. 4¿Dec. 14, 2025) at the Eskenazi Museum will provide new impulses to thinking through this aspect from an American perspective. Taking advantage of this class (both in terms context and in terms of in-person visits), this class explores the art in the Third Reich and the postwar struggle to come to terms with the regime¿s legacy in popular culture and art but also art history. The class thus stresses the connection between cultural production and historical context and aims to foster students¿ ability to engage this crucial connection critically. In so doing, the class pursues a twofold approach: It combines an introduction to major events and basic ideological frameworks with a close look at the aesthetic objects themselves, juxtaposing different forms of reading and analyses. This allows us to shed light on the ways in which the role of an artifact shifts when looked at from different disciplinary perspectives (art history, history, law, journalism, literature, etc.). In turn, the class asks how these various perspectives shape the way we think and write about a subject matter. In sum, the class aims to sharpen students¿ self-awareness as both writers and readers and provide a sophisticated tool kit for their academic as much as future professional pursuits.