Helft Russland [Help Russia]

Kollwitz designed this image for a poster appealing for aid to famine relief efforts in the struggling new nation, the Soviet Union. The composition, with the emaciated young man with helping hands reaching toward him, makes her plea explicit. In the years following World War I, Kollwitz created many such prints to aid with the relief of countless victims of post-war hunger, unemployment, and poverty by using posters to draw attention to their plight. While Kollwitz did not align herself with any radical political groups, she was always outspoken in her support of the rights of people of all nations.