George Gross and his Political Satire

It was in the seventies when I was ready to file as a Conscientious Objector that I found the German anti-war artist known as George Gross. He lived in Pre-World War Germany and showed the leftover horror of what World War One did to the German population and he reflected that in his pen and inks as well as his oils. I studied his work while I was a student at PAFA in Philly. His lessons were that the torn up German population was a bitter place to live with much debauchery and low living going on. He had the good sense to show it in his drawings. The one I selected is one of a German soldier being given a physical for entree into service, just like the one I had just gone through as a civilian in the current draft process in 1968. The drawing Mr Gross did kind of emphasized how the German Army was ready to take almost anyone even a skeleton who looks he needs a coffin rather than an Army uniform. But the title Mr. Gross gave it was one that stated that 'he qualified' because of how desperate they were for men in their corp. This was art that had content to it, its art that has "something to say" however unpopular it might have been it did make an observation about society. As one can see every so often I too have "something to say" Mr. Gross actually made it out of Nazi Germany to NYC where he taught in a school their, and one of his students was a teacher of our Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia Marshal Glasser. Marshal was in his later years when I was a student at the Penn Academy of the Fine Arts. Problem was I didn't know had such a personal knowledge of George Gross and I didn't find that out until after I had graduated. I've seen some of Mr.Gross's watercolors that he did since coming to the United States and they were much more colorful and cheerful in their content. I was glad to see that.