Kollwitz’s last major sculptural work was created in the spring of 1938: Mother with dead Son, also called Pietà.
Her increasing age and the limited income possibilities in the Third Reich forced Käthe Kollwitz to model sculptures only in smaller formats. The looming Second World War brought back memories of the death of her son Peter. Above all, the motif of mothers protecting their children became an important theme, for which Käthe Kollwitz achieved interesting pictorial presentations in sculpture and graphic art. The sculpture Mother with dead Son represented a renewed intimate confrontation with her son, who died at an early age.
