Banning Art In Germany

In 1933, National Socialist leaders came to power in Germany and brought with them a set of plans and ambitions to take over Europe. After a humiliating defeat in World War I, Nazi leaders became intent on restoring their respect and integrity in the world. The Treaty of Versailles added salt to their wounds and left a void in the ego of Germany. Therefore, in order to avenge their wounds, the Nazi’s made plans to not only retrieve land that was lost in World War I but to conquer the whole of Europe. However, filling the void in their ego’s, and most importunately in their citizens, was not going to be a simple task. There was a dire need of successive public policies or a movement, that will allow the manipulation of the social lives of its

Therefore, the Nazi’s began an effort to bring the art world under their influence. They put bans on foreign entertainment, However, contradictory in terms of banning work from the United States of America, and denigrated the Jews from participating in artistic activities, purging their cultural organizations. Instead, the arts glorified living in a family, being part of a larger community, the struggles and hard work of laborers, and heroic efforts made by soldiers on battlefields. These were the efforts of Nazi’s to rationalize and install German values as part of a larger struggle to purify Germany and create an industry that is led by the self-sacrifice of

Therefore, it was the ethnic cleansing of German art and culture fomented by antisemitism, that became the guiding force, or motivator, of the movement in its earliest days. The arts were had become a tool that was functioning in promoting the interests of the Nazi community, therefore, the influence of the Jews was not to be tolerated. Steinweis argues that a parallel cultural policy came into existent which at one end attempted to eliminate the abrupt influences by the Jews and on the other build the support and patronage of the regime to artists whose work was to be considered German. Allan mentions these measures were met with approval in the art world and the German