WALDEMAR FLAIG. City motif (probably Meersburg), oil on canvas, signed and dated 1922.

Image dimensions 76 x 59 cm. Frame dimensions 94 x 75 cm.

This winter landscape by Waldemar Flaig from 1922 is a powerful expression of his expressive, illustrative expressionism. The painting, with its characteristic angular composition, thick brushwork and cold color scale dominated by blue and white, reflects both the artist's technique and his inner life.

Flaig painted this just a few years after he recovered from severe war injuries he sustained in the First World War. These experiences often permeate his works, not as direct depictions of war but rather as an emotional weight or charge — as in this work: a seemingly still winter motif, but in which the angled building structure, the forceful contours and the somewhat gloomy sky create a sense of both movement and inner tension.

The village setting — most likely a view from Meersburg — shows the pitched roofs covered in snow, where rows of houses are squeezed together under the cold cover. The snow-covered landscape is not romantic, but almost cubically broken into surfaces and volumes, something that can be attributed to German Expressionism's penchant for embodying emotion through form. The strong lines framing the outlines of the houses and the trees also hint at a graphic thinking, which fits well with Flaig's background as an accomplished graphic artist.

Stylistically, this 1922 painting finds itself at a breaking point in Flaig's career, where his war-damaged inner life, his brief but intense period as an artist, and his closeness to German Expressionists such as Otto Dix and Karl Hofer merge into a distinctive, emotionally resonant pictorial world. It combines everyday life and vision — a snow-covered neighborhood turns into a psychological landscape.

Waldemar Flaig (1892—1932) was a German painter and graphic artist whose artistry was characterized by a deep fervor and an expressive imagery. He grew up in Villingen in the Black Forest and trained at the art academies in Karlsruhe and Munich. Despite a short life, he managed to create a diverse and personal artistic heritage, with expressionism becoming his most important design language.

Despite his growing reputation, he suffered from illness and died at only 40 years old. Tragically, several of his works later came to be destroyed during the Nazi action against so-called “Entartete Kunst”. Waldemar Flaig's art testifies to a vision of life coloured by both war and beauty, in which a keen sense of observation is combined with an expression of tenderness and humanism. In retrospect, his art has been revalued and he is today regarded as one of southern Germany's more important expressionists of the interwar period.