Luna Park, Berlin, 1914

 Tappert’s Luna Park, displays many stylistic hallmarks of the Neue Secession (New Secession) in Berlin – non-naturalistic colors applied boldly and brightly; simplified shapes; strong gestural brushstrokes; and distortion of natural forms.  Together these stylistic choices imparted their work with a heightened emotional intensity, and often included an abstract symbolism or a critical social commentary on contemporary life.

While many of the German Expressionists embraced abstraction, such as Kandinsky, others clung to themes drawn from the realities of modern life.  Tappert’s Luna Park depicts the carousel of the famous amusement park located on the Halensee Lake in Berlin at night.  The park was opened in 1909 and was modeled after Luna Park in Coney Island, Brooklyn, which had been a great success since it opened in 1903.  Indeed, following the New York amusement park, Luna Parks were opened across the country and internationally, many by Frederick Ingersoll of the Ingersoll Construction Company.  While the parks were places of amusement they also were known for their spectacles — both the cast of characters on display and the thousands of artificial lights used to decorate and illuminate the grounds during the evening hours. Through wide swaths of yellow, Tappert forcefully conveys the blazing lights flooding the area around the carousel as opposed to the deep night sky and the promenade where the figures stand.  Tappert and many of the Expressionist painters employed this type of color contrast to convey dissatisfaction or alienation from modern life. The severe, mask-like faces in Luna Park, share in this aesthetic but the overall mood in the picture is not sinister.  Red candy stripes on the right and in the center combine with the yellow and green globes in the upper corner or around the carousel imparting a happier overall tone to Luna Park.