"Degenerate" Art

    By the late 19th century, The term degeneracy originated in Germany when the critic and author Max Nordau(Jewish key figure in the Zionist movement) developed a critique of modern art, explained as the work of those so corrupted and enfeebled by modern life that they have lost the self-control needed to produce coherent works. Nordau praised traditional German culture while referring to Impressionism as a sign of a diseased visual cortex. Max Nordau's theory of artistic degeneracy would be seized upon by German Nazis during the Weimar Republic for antisemitic and racist demand for Aryan purity in art.

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