The Dark, Eerie Art of Alfred Kubin
Remarkable visions from this Symbolist artist
Christopher P Jones is the author of How to Read Paintings, an introduction to some of the most fascinating artworks in art history.
**This article includes images that some may find disturbing
Alfred Kubin was an Austrian illustrator and printmaker. His remarkable body of work — most especially his ink and wash drawings — contain strange spectral visions that point both to a troubled mind and an important talent.
Born in 1877, Kubin’s adolescence was marked by episodes of depression and inner terror. Once, when visiting his mother’s grave, he attempted suicide. The gun he used turned out to be rusty and failed to go off. At the age of 19, he entered the Austrian army only for the enlistment to result in a nervous breakdown.
Kubin’s anxieties appear to have found some respite in art. By his early twenties, he had discovered the writings of Edgar Allan Poe and Fyodor Dostoevsky and began illustrating their works.
He deeply admired the imagery of Max Klinger, especially Klinger’s prints which have about them a dreamlike — or rather nightmarish — quality. Under this inspiration, Kubin pursued an intense phase of drawing, producing an extraordinarily vivid and at times challenging portfolio of work.
Here’s a selection…
The Witch (1900)
In this first image, titled The Witch, Kubin gives us a terrifying premonition of arbitrary power.
One of Kubin’s early influences was the artist Francisco Goya, who made The Disasters of War series of plates between 1810 and 1820 — a likely inspiration for this macabre image of warfare or else a nightmarish vision of personal helplessness.
On the uppermost branch of a tree, a hair-raised woman sits with her arms aloft as if conducting an invisible orchestra, whilst on the tree below various figures hang by the neck.
The Lady on a Horse (1901)
In 1898, Kubin went to Munich to study art. Here he developed his ink and wash technique that emulated the feel of the prints of Max Klinger.
In this drawing, titled The Lady on a Horse, a woman in a top hat and an impressive black gown sits side-saddle on a rocking horse, whose rocking rails are made from enormous metal blades.
As a personal vision of the Femme Fatale figure, Kubin depicts an act of malevolent domination as the woman rocks back and forth, whilst beneath the blades figures are sliced up mercilessly.
The Moment of Birth (1902)
In 1902 Kubin had his first exhibition at the Cassirer Gallery in Berlin, and as his reputation increased, he was hired to complete numerous book illustrations.
In this image, The Moment of Birth, created in 1902, a monstrous crab with a head that is more like a skull, appears to draw out babies from a lake or canal. Like many of his various portrayals of bizarre animals, the image evokes a sinister expectation of an irrational reality.
And yet, in a rare moment of joy, a newborn baby leaps away out into the world.
One Woman For All (1901)
Kubin’s art turns a shade darker with a series of images in which his own troubled sexual destiny was expressed with repellent implications.
The young Kubin remained heavily influenced by Max Klinger, whose fantastical and often sexually charged images caused Kubin to later write: “Here a new art was thrown open to me, which offered free play for the imaginative expression of every conceivable world of feeling. Before putting the engravings away I swore that I would dedicate my life to the creation of similar works.”
In this work, One Woman For All, the disturbing story is all too easy to read — perhaps expressing Kubin’s perspective of sexuality, that of an untrammelled and despicable urge.
Death Jump (1902)
In what may be considered a more humourous image, if not one that contains yet more evidence of the artist’s anxieties about sex, Death Jump shows a young man diving headlong into an enormous vulva.
Once again, the extraordinary world Kubin created in his drawings reflects his own inner turmoil and private desires.
Angst (1903)
In this final image, Angst, drawn in 1903, Kubin shows a nightmarish struggle between a naked figure who attempts to climb out of a sheer chasm and a diabolical ghost pulling him back down.
It is perhaps a fitting image to conclude with, from an artist whose talents and demons seem equally matched.
From 1906 until his death, Kubin lived a reclusive life in a manor house on a 12th century estate in Upper Austria. He died in 1959, aged 82.
Christopher P Jones is the author of How to Read Paintings, an introduction to some of the most fascinating artworks in art history.
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