22 April marks the 81st anniversary of the death of Käthe Kollwitz (1867–1945) – one of the most significant graphic artists and sculptors of the 20th century. We commemorate an artist whose view of the world was characterised by deep empathy and social awareness. Yet Käthe Kollwitz’s life and times cannot be fully understood through drawings and prints alone. The cinema of the 1920s and early 1930s also tells of the upheavals, hopes and tensions that surrounded her.
As part of the current special exhibition, the Käthe Kollwitz Museum Berlin, in collaboration with the Deutsche Kinemathek and the Bundesplatz-Kino, invites you to a special cinematic weekend: Under the title “Käthe Kollwitz Goes to the Cinema”, four films that Käthe Kollwitz is known to have known and appreciated will be screened at the Bundesplatz-Kino on 25 and 26 April 2026.
The programme forms part of the current special exhibition “Käthe Kollwitz and the Theatre” and offers a new perspective on the artist: as an attentive witness to her times, including the early days of cinema.
Film series at the Bundesplatz-Kino
„Käthe Kollwitz goes to the Cinema”
Saturday 25 April and Sunday 26 April 2026
Admission is 10 euros per film per person.
The world-famous graphic artist and sculptor Käthe Kollwitz was fascinated by the then-new medium of film and is known to have attended cinema screenings. In 1934, in her response to a survey of prominent figures conducted by the journalist Carl Seelig on behalf of the *Neue Zürcher Zeitung*, she named six films that she particularly admired.
The Bundesplatz Cinema is presenting four of these works. Two of them also bear a special personal connection: they feature Maria Matray, a niece of Käthe Kollwitz. Thus, the films not only provide a historical context but also reveal a surprisingly immediate closeness – between artistic creation, family ties and the moving images of an era that also shaped Kollwitz.
We invite you to rediscover these connections: in the exhibition, in the film programme and through mindful viewing.
Each screening will be preceded by a short introduction by Dr Annette Seeler, guest curator of the special exhibition at the Käthe Kollwitz Museum in Berlin.
