Totes Meer [SEP] creator
Totes Meer
Totes Meer (German for "Dead Sea") is a 1941 oil-on-canvas painting by Paul Nash. It depicts a moonlit landscape populated by a graveyard of crashed aircraft of the German Luftwaffe. The broken shards of metal from the wings and fuselages resemble a seascape of jagged ice, possibly inspired by Caspar David Friedrich's "The Sea of Ice". It measures and has been in the collection of the Tate Gallery since 1946.
Background.
Nash was an official war artist in
the First and Second World Wars. In 1940, he was asked to work for the Air Ministry, and Nash started work on "Totes Meer" that year. Some representatives of the Air Ministry disliked his style of art, and his full-time position was terminated before the end of the year. "Totes Meer" was completed in 1941, and offered to the War Artists' Advisory Committee in 1941. Nash was paid £150 for the painting.
Description.
The work was based on sketches and