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National Hellenic Museum Virtual Exhibitions

Landscapes

Among art collectors and historians, Alexander Mohr is known primarily as a landscape painter. His landscapes belong to a style that the German critic Rainer Zimmerman called “expressive realism,” a style which combines the basic colors and forms of Expressionism with a commitment to realism.

These kinds of landscapes in particular were popular with more conservative art-buying audiences, particularly after the Second World War. However, they also marked the end of his association with more avant-garde artistic circles which had characterized his early training and career.

Mohr’s approach to landscapes evolved over the course of his career. Earlier he used lighter colors and soft shapes, suggesting a kind of mythic quality. However, later, he chose bolder colors and more defined shapes, creating a harsher, arguably more realistic image. Some have suggested that these changes suggest Mohr’s shift away from the idealized Hellenism of his youth to a more realistic view of the Greece he saw around him (a Greece he saw in the midst of war for nearly a decade). It should be noted that others hold that this shift in style has much more to do with the changing tastes of art audiences and buyers than any philosophical shift on the part of the artist.

See this transformation for yourself in the paintings displayed here.

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NHM Collection
2016.14.19

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NHM Collection
2016.14.8

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NHM Collection
2016.14.12

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NHM Collection
2016.14.13

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NHM Collection
2016.14.5

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NHM Collection
2016.14.15

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NHM Collection
2016.14.16

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NHM Collection
2016.14.7

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NHM Collection
2016.14.2