ABSTRACT
National Socialist art harked back to the traditions of nineteenth-century genre painting. The techniques and iconography were those of the past. The content of the painting was all-important: form subordinated to the need to tell an inspiring story, to increase the viewer’s appreciation of everyday life, to show the spiritual significance of landscape, the dignity of labour and the heroism of war. There was nothing new in an approach which rejected all modern art as degenerate and alien to the German spirit. All that was new was the choice of specifically National Socialist themes, uniforms or personalities.
