Propaganda in Artform

Image: Cover of 'Art Forms in Nature', 1899

Ernst Haeckel, Germany 1899

Physician, zoologist and artist Ernst Haeckel discovered numerous species and coined key terms in biology. His many illustrated publications have been highly influential in art and popular culture, and they are credited for having prepared the wide acceptance of Darwinism as a biological theory during the early 20th century in Germany. Haeckel’s drawings describe the morphology of species in terms of platonic geometry; and they stylize, often idealize, the natural structures he discovered. His highly popular taxonomy diagrams and species illustrations helped disseminate his particular ideology. He derived from his version of evolutionary theory a general critique of dualism, and declared monism as the link between religion and science.

Ernst Haeckel also propagated a form of social Darwinism. His phrase “politics is applied biology” has been used to justify racism, which casts a shadow over his achievements as a scientist and illustrator. It also stands as a reminder of the dangers of totalizing ideas and forms of representation.

While Haeckel’s taxonomic work has made significant contributions to the field of biology, his work on evolutionary theories has been largely debunked. For example, Haeckel is well known for his idealized illustrations in support of “recapitulation theory”3, which claims that the embryonic development of animals resembles the successive adult stages of its species evolution. Today this idea is sufficiently disproved and considered part of “biological mythology”. The prevailing idealistic philosophy (Hegel et al.) of the time played an important role in Haeckel’s belief in the progressive perfection of embryonic growth.

Haeckel used his stunning illustration work as propaganda to advertise his very particular worldviews. In the 1860’s he received breakthrough recognition by describing and illustrating a variety of new species of radiolarian. Yet it has been argued that Haeckel’s artistic representations reveal his non-Darwinian approach. Darwin emphasized the variability of organisms, the very material of evolutionary adaptation and development; while Haeckel showed no interest in variable traits.4

Haeckel’s most widely distributed publication Art Forms in Nature inspired and provoked artists such as Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky and Max Ernst, and impacted the Jugendstil movement at the beginning of the twentieth century. The publication consisted of obsessively detailed illustrations of maritime species and other animals, staged as decontextualized artifacts. Haeckel intended to evoke a deep affection for nature in his readers, which he believed could only be inspired by vivid illustration. His specimen drawings are not exact anatomical depictions, but idealized artistic interpretations. He rendered the perfect versions of the natural structures he discovered – ornate, speckless and geometrically coherent. He aimed at revealing a certain morphological essence of each creature he discussed, a kind of a prototype state of a mathematical order. He was convinced that to depict the wonders of nature accurately was not only to discover “the laws of their origin and evolution but also to press into the secret parts of their beauty by sketching and painting.”5 Ernst Haeckel was famous for his idealized representations and classifications of natural structures and became a towering presence as an evolutionary theorist at the turn of the century.

Hawkins, Mike (1997). Social Darwinism in European and American Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 140.

“Ernst Haeckel” (biography), UC Berkeley, 2004, webpage: BerkeleyEdu-Haeckel

Kutschera, Ulrich; Levit, Georgy S.; Hossfeld, Uwe (1 May 2019). “Ernst Haeckel (1834–1919): The German Darwin and his impact on modern biology”. Theory in Biosciences. 138 (1): 1–7. doi:10.1007/s12064-01900276-4. ISSN 1611-7530. PMID 30799517.

David, Brody (2002). Ernst Haeckel and the Microbial Baroque. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 7.

Watts, E., Levit, G.S. & Hossfeld, U. Ernst Haeckel’s contribution to Evo-Devo and scientific debate: a re-evaluation of Haeckel’s controversial illustrations in US textbooks in response to creationist accusations. Theory Biosci. 138, 9–29 (2019).

Haeckel, Ernst. Art Forms In Nature. (reprint of 1904.) Prestel Pub, 2004.

Richards, Robert J. (2009) The Tragic Sense of Ernst Haeckel: His Scientific and Artistic Struggles.

Ernst Haeckel, The Riddle of the Universe (New York: Harper & Bros., 1900)

Christoph Kockerbeck, Ernst Haeckels ‘Kunstformen der Natur’ und ihr Einfluß auf die deutsche bildende Kunst der Jahrhundertwende (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 1986).

Haeckel, Wanderbilder [p. 3 of the unnumbered pages].

Peter Bowler, The Non-Darwinian Revolution: Reinterpreting a Historical Myth (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988), 83

Figure 1 (top): Cover of Art Forms in Nature Figure 2 (bottom): Cyrotoidea, Radiolaria illustration by Haeckel

Figure 3: Geometric analysis, morphological study of plants

Figure 4 (top): Plate sketch by E. Haeckel Figure 5 (bottom): Art Forms in Nature illustration plate draft

Figure 6: Keimesgeschichte des Antlitzes

Figure 7: ‘Ueber die Arbeitstheilung’in Natur und Menschenleben.’ First book pages. (‘About the Division of Labor in Nature and Human Life’)