Little Soldiers is a series about the duality of innocence and indoctrination experienced by me as a child in the former GDR. The life-sized portrait of a toy soldier give a human dimension to the profound impact of state-controlled education and the loss of individual freedom in the name of collective socialist ideals.
As children, we played with toy soldiers and were unknowingly prepared for the shooting lessons we later had at school. Forced camaraderie and solidarity that was expected and that overshadowed the innocence and freedom of our childhood. The absurd facial expressions of the figures depicted, result from the original and not always successful hand painting of the miniature soldiers‘ faces and play with the absurdity of the country‘s overall social and political structure. The backgrounds of the paintings are monochromatic as the monotonous uniformity that made up our everyday lives. Through these introspective paintings, I want to illustrate the nature of growing up in a society where personal identity has been sacrificed for the greater good.