Last January workers in Berlin were digging a tunnel for a new subway when they found a bronze bust in the shovel of a front loader. It turns out that the bust was made by German sculptor Edwin Scharff, with an actress named Anni Mewes as its subject. The work was one of thousands labeled as “degenerate” art by Hitler’s regime and paraded around the country in 1937 and featured in a 1941 anti-Semitic propaganda film in an attempt to ridicule modern art. Several finds and ten months later, 11 terracotta and bronze works are now on display at Berlin’s Neues Museum. Click through for photos of the sculptures and the exhibit.
A Likeness of Actress Anni Mewes by Edwin Scharff (1921)
Female Dancer by Marg Moll (1930)
Pregnant Woman by Emy Roeder (1918)
Standing Girl by Otto Braun (1930)
Kopf by Otto Freundlich
All images via.