Zweite Zukunft

The German painter, sculptor, and printmaker Max Klinger created dream worlds filled with dark, evocative symbolism. Eve and the Future, a strange cycle of etchings, treats the biblical subject of the Fall by envisioning three future consequences of Eve’s sin. The Second Future represents the time after Eve has taken the forbidden fruit and discovered her nakedness—and, in Klinger’s view, her sexuality. Here Klinger gives us a satyrlike creature holding a spear atop a primordial snake swimming in a wasteland. Is there any distance between this predatory, prehistoric human and animals? It is truly a fall from grace. Aquatint enables Klinger to achieve an otherworldly, almost hallucinatory atmosphere for his fantastical creatures.