Werner Drewes

(Association of American Artists, Sept. 7–Oct. 5, 1985)

The memorial exhibition of Werner Drewe's prints, woodcuts and collages at AAA covers the artist's lifetime of work (1899–1985). Drewes was not much of an innovator, rather he was able to assimilate all that he saw and use it in his own work. The result is a survey of the boldest movements of art in this century.
   The show begins with a woodcut of a desolate road leading back into an ominous horizon. The road is lined on one side with full-blossomed trees and on the other with stark skeletal empty-leaved trees. The sky is rendered with arc lines scraped in varying thicknesses. Munch is evoked.
   The next group, from the 1920s, which are the most interesting, are finely etched scenes of cities and close-up views of factory walls and grain elevators. These scenes clearly celebrate the optimism of the time as the skyscrapers started rising and the vastness of the huge factories seemed to be the new monuments indicating an explosion of growth. In these views he seems to be framing his compositions as a photograph would—concentrating on depicting as much of the amazing new structures as can fit in his frame. Letting the particular detail explain the overall. He was clearly in love with the city and the rise of the city.
   The differing thicknesses and concentration of his fine, cross-hatched lines are suited for cleanly defining the geometry of the sculptures. The black and white contrasts and the differing light and playful shadows give a soft expression without sentimentality.
   One extraordinary view (Elevated, 1931) is done as if by high contrast photography, so only the most extreme lights and shadow are revealed. Here the foreground is open as raised railroad tracks recede into and around the bend in the mid-ground, while on the other side of the tracks, the huge walls and canyons of the looming city begins as strong a contrast as a sea against shore.
   At the end of the '20s he studied with Kandinsky and this is a little too obvious in the next group displayed. This is when he leaves realism. He's also weaving in the odd inkblot-like shapes of surrealism and the flattened patterns of Cubism.
   The works of his last years (after a 25 year hiatus) become much simpler and more decorative. He's using muted colors and geometric shapes that look as if they were cut from construction paper and collaged safely onto a surface treated with differing textures and blotches of orange and light browns or greens with black or gray, olive and black.
   Ultimately, there was nothing original about Drewes' work, but this exhibit shows a man who was able to adapt from the most advanced styles of the day and if not create, imitate the masters to a skilled degree and never succumb to the petty or mundane.

(ARTS, November 1985)