Grief and sorrow - Expressionism.

Kathe Kollwitz - "Woman with Dead Child", 1903, etching

Mary Wigman - Hexentanz

Mary Wigman - "Hexentanz" (choreographed 1914, filmed 1930)

A couple of weeks ago while teaching Expressionist theory, well before the unimaginable tragedy in Newtown, CT, I realized there were connections to be made between the figures in Kollwitz's etching and Mary Wigman's "Hexentanz" (Witch Dance).  Both women sit on the ground.  Kollwitz's woman, with dancer's feet, could be the performer in Wigman's film, and vice versa.  In the etching, the mother looks part lioness, just as Wigman's 'witch' is animal-like.  Gesture in both pieces, so similar, expresses the innermost feelings of primal, intense grief, loss, anguish.