Der Totentanz Von Anno Neun 1908

Albin Egger-Lienz made this painting, "Der Totentanz Von Anno Neun", with oil on canvas. Look at the way the palette is so close in tone, creating a sense of everything being made of the same stuff. It's like the figures are emerging from the earth itself, slowly and painfully. The painting is all about texture, isn't it? It feels rough, like the ground they are walking on. It is as though everything is rendered with earth or dust, giving the figures a strange ghostly presence, like they're not quite here and not quite gone. Notice how the color is muted, almost like a faded photograph, and then there is death himself looming, so present, so well defined. You can almost feel the weight of that moment. I can't help but think of Käthe Kollwitz, another artist grappling with the weight of human suffering. Like Kollwitz, Egger-Lienz reminds us that art is not just about pretty pictures; it's about bearing witness, about feeling, and about trying to make sense of the messy, complicated world we live in.