Carl Grossberg – Der Gelbe Kessel - The Yellow Kettle (1933)

Louisiana Poster with the work, Der Gelbe Kessel - The Yellow Kettle (1933), by the German artist, Carl Grossberg (1894-1940). The poster is published in 2022 in connection with Louisiana's exhibition about Germany in the 1920s, The Cold Eye. Grossberg's yellow kettle is a central expression of part of the aesthetics that arose in 1920s German art with the rational and registering gaze, following the artistic direction, Neue Sachlichkeit—the new matter-of-factness or objectivity.

In the tumultuous and contradictory period after the First World War, a fascination with the American model of society arises in Germany. Streamlining the work processes is imported to German companies and leads to rapid mechanization and industrialization.

The rational—i.e. exposed by the German artistic movement, Neue Sachlichkeit—and an aestheticization of the industrial machines, becomes a new norm that strongly influences social and cultural life.

This new norm is clearly seen in Grossberg's minimalist compositions of industrial plants—as for example here, The Yellow Kettle.