Hitler's Taste in Art

That Adolf Hitler chose to hang "Cupid Complaining to Venus" by Lucas Cranach the Elder in his private gallery is not at all surprising.

Being old, distinctly German, and Latinate in reference -- as well as curiously unsexy -- Cranach's painted panel was exactly to Hitler's taste.

Having twice applied (unsuccessfully) to the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna before he became a dictator, der Fuehrer thought himself a connoisseur and knew what he liked.

What he didn't like was unfamiliar modern art, which his Reich accordingly attacked as incomprehensible and degenerate. He preferred his art replete with Greco-Roman references (to prove that it was "civilized") but didn't want anyone to mistake it as Italian. It had to look proudly German. The Cranach fit the bill, with Venus's narrow shoulders and prominent stomach.

Though she dresses as a courtesan, in necklaces of gold and a fabulous show-off hat, Hitler's love goddess is oddly unsensual. She isn't hot, she's chilled. This is usually the case with Lucas Cranach's nudes. "In spite of their side-long glances," wrote scholar Kenneth Clark, "his sirens never cease to be objets d'art, to be enjoyed, by him who may, as crystals or enamels."

-- Paul Richard

Paul Richard is a Washington Post art critic.