by Willi Dirx (1917 – 2002)
Bronze casting, 14 panels 42 cm by 20 cm by 4 cm (L x B x H), 1967
The Stations of the Cross in the lower church, photos: Max Schulz 2019
Primarily, the Wuppertal artist Willi Dirx was a wood engraver and illustrator, yet he also designed church stained-glass windows and portals, outfitting entire churches. He created a 'Stations of the Cross' for the lower church of Liebfrauen, which served as a church of adoration. It still adorns the room today, even though the concrete walls and bronze plaques have grown dark (all 14 stations: see the 'Stations of the Cross' tour).
The panels depict the Passion in a simplified and concentrated way; the images feature only Jesus, the cross, and the figures involved, with barely any material backdrop and never a natural setting. This 'Stations of the Cross' condenses the events without overstating them, stays true to realism, and is simple in an appealing way.
This can be shown in more detail for one station.
Fifth Station: Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus to carry His cross
Photo: Max Schulz 2019
A sprawling cross structures and dominates the image, as at almost all stations; it extends beyond the bronze plate that forms the background. Any frame is too small for what is to be displayed. One sees a slender body of Jesus, fallen to its knees under the burden of the cross the right hand still touching. Arms and bare feet emerge from the long robe, the face is inclined toward the earth, seen in profile, a head of hair and a crown of thorns intertwined almost indistinguishably. Simon of Cyrene, the man forced to assist with the execution by carrying the cross, stands slightly leaning forward behind Jesus, gripping it with both hands, looking out of the frame, yet almost expressionless, an everyman. Three hands thus hold the cross that Simon binds to Jesus. The top-left crossbeam of the cross almost reaches a group of women who are actually standing in the background, one of them holding a child in her arms. They show sympathy in different ways; one of the women throws her arms up, another is literally moved.
The painting as a whole is an outcry, even though the central figures are silent. Indeed, Dirx’s work is often placed in the tradition of expressionism. For the work of Otto Pankok, with whom Dirx was friends, people once spoke of 'expressive realism'. Perhaps that applies to Dirx as well.
Willi Dirx, Foto: Stadt Wuppertal
Willi Dirx, whose most important works were executed in the classic flat woodcut technique and often published as print portfolios or book illustrations, was born in Recklinghausen in 1917, lived in Duisburg after his school years, and—following his studies at the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf and his military service—lived for the longest part of his life in Wuppertal from 1945 to 2002.
He was shaped by his experiences of war, later by upheavals such as the civil rights movement in the USA or liberation movements in Latin America, as well as by numerous travels and contacts in what was then called the Eastern Bloc. An acquaintance mentioned a book about the 70-year-old artist 'Im Unterwegs zuhaus [On the Road at Home]'. He was considered an unconventional Catholic. In addition to Pankok, he was also friends with Otto Dix and Heinrich Böll, and he contributed woodcuts to the first edition of Ernesto Cardenal’s Psalms. Human suffering, as well as hope as a motif, are often found in his work.
He has created numerous images of the Passion of Jesus and entire Stations of the Cross, as woodcuts and cast metal plaques. An almost identical cast aluminum version of the Liebfrauen Station of the Cross can be found at the cemetery of the Franciscan Sisters in Essen-Bedingrade. Until 2013, it was located in the Church of St. Hubertus in Essen-Bergerhausen. Deviating from the most common Way of the Cross format, it includes a 15th station: the Resurrection, the overcoming of suffering.
References:
Garweg, Udo u.a. (Hrsg.): Wuppertaler Künstlerverzeichnis, Wuppertal 2000.
Lambertz, Josef: Im Unterwegs zuhaus. Holzschnitte von Willi Dirx und Bildmeditationen, Aachen 1987.
Neukirchen, Daniel: Berühmte Wuppertaler. Willi Dirx: Das Grauen des Krieges mit Kunst verarbeitet, in: Westdeutsche Zeitung (August 13th, 2017),
retrieved from https://www.wz.de/nrw/wuppertal/kultur/willi-dirx-das-grauen-des-kriegs-mit-kunst-verarbeitet_aid-26685551 (June 7th, 2019).
