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Käthe

Children often climb the bronze Käthe at Kollwitz Platz – and most residents appreciate that. By giving his sculpture a particularly wide and low pedestal, the sculptor Gustav Seitz intentionally enabled an easy, effortless access to his larger-than-life, sitting figure.
This proximity to the people would certainly have been appreciated by Käthe Kollwitz, too – even including the shiny nose polished by the many hands that touched it.
In 1956 the berlin magistrate commissioned the sculptor but obviously they expected a heroic, fierce figure. The image of an old, restful woman consequently was much criticised.
The topics of graphic artist and sculptor Käthe Kollwitz were human suffering and poverty. She lived and worked with her husband, the doctor Karl Kollwitz, in Weißenburger Strasse 25; the street was later renamed Kollwitzstrasse. Here, she had one of her studios while he ran a Statuary Health Insurance Surgery where he treated the poor for free. In 1946, in honour of the artist, the Wörther Platz was renamed Kollwitzplatz on the 8th July – her birthday.