Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1260764
Art Wirken Restrictions are liberating. Not when producers create them, mind you, but when designers make them ourselves as artists. At the very least, restrictions can focus direction. This is true if a decision is made to use only natural light, or to shoot on mm stock, or to work, heaven forbid, within a certain budget range. One such restriction was made while deciding how to decorate the walls of some of our standing sets. In researching the period, I was reminded of the competing art shows itler had in unich in . One show, "Entartete unst," featured art deemed degenerate by the Third Reich. The other show, "The Great German Art Exhibition," featured roughly nine hundred pieces deemed appropriate for itler's new vision of Germany. Each day, around twenty thousand people lined up to see the degenerate art, while no more than thirty-fi ve hundred a day passed through the sanctioned art show. It became clear where the more interesting and relevant pieces were, which is why thousands of them were burned, and even more illegally appropriated by offi cials as investments and collateral for future transactions. Artists degenerate enough to grace Hunters' walls included Ernst irchner, Paul lee, Gustav limt, assily andinsky, ax eckmann, arc Chagall, Lyonel Feininger, Piet ondrian, odigliani and Egon Schiele. The story of these artworks and their journey from confi scation to repatriation became central to what appeared on the hero walls in Hunters. henever possible, set decorator Cathy arshall pulled exclusively from this catalogue of paintings and artwork for the standing sets. Concentrating on this catalogue added depth to eyer's backstory in particular, and assured that there was meaningful art on every wall. ow did he get his hands on these pieces, and why did he feel a need to protect them from the hands of his enemies Furthermore, why had he somehow repatriated three works by ans Thoma, one of itler's favorites, and placed them in his library These answers aren't revealed until the last episode of the series, but an art historian might crack the series' secrets well in advance. The icing on the wall-art-as-metaphor cake comes in the fi nal episode of Hunters, with two additional featured pieces. The fi rst, Gerbrand van den Eeckhout's, Isaac Blessing Jacob, features a deception in order to receive a blessing. The second is Rubens' Wolf and Fox Hunt, a piece featuring, of all things, a wolf hunt in a show about people hunting a notorious Nazi known as The olf. A. DEGENERATE ART CONCEPT: STUDIO PRESENTATION BY CURT BEECH. B. SWISS BANK SECRET SUBTERRANEAN PLUNDER ROOM. PHOTO BY CATHY MARSHALL. C. MEYER OFFERMAN'S SITTING ROOM AT THE EXPLORER'S CLUB, NYC. PETER PAUL RUBENS' WOLF AND FOX HUNT, CA. 1616 HANGS TO THE RIGHT OF MEYER'S BED. MEYER'S HUNTERS ARE SEARCHING FOR A NOTORIOUS NAZI CALLED THE WOLF THROUGHOUT THE SERIES. A B C