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At the Window II
Karl Hofer (German, 1878–1955)
c. 1923
- Medium
- lithograph
- Classification
- Dimensions
- Image: 20.2 x 14.3 cm (7 15/16 x 5 5/8 in.)
- Culture
- Germany, 20th century
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Prints
- Credit line
- Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Teens profiles and older: its museum says too little about what it shows to place it for younger viewers. How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
Windows appear frequently throughout the work of Karl Hofer, who created nearly 300 prints. Dating from a period that Hofer spent in his native Germany between the First and Second World Wars, this lithograph reflects the anxiety and chaos that characterized the country during that time. Figures with masklike faces crowd the space of an interior without interacting. It remains unclear whether they block the view to the outside world that the window would otherwise provide or are instead viewed from a building’s exterior. Enhanced by the jagged, sketchy lines used to render the figures, the composition conveys a sense of alienation and unease.
