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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Philip Oltermann in Berlin

Jürgen Wittdorf: Berlin gallery revives homoerotic art of communist era

Under the shower (1964)
Under the Shower (1964). Photograph: Courtesy: Privatsammlung Berlin und Schloss Biesdorf

Seven men wash the sweat off their toned bodies in a communal shower. Unless you squint and mistake a tightly gripped bar of soap for something else, their limbs are suspended in tantalising proximity but never quite touch.

The German artist Jürgen Wittdorf’s 1963 linocut print, from a series titled Youth and Sport, may look like something out of a top-shelf graphic novel or the virile drawings of the gay liberation icon Tom of Finland.

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