East German artist Willi Sitte dead at 92

[June 10, 2013]  BERLIN (AP) -- Willi Sitte, one of East Germany's most eminent artists and a key representative of Communism's preferred socialist realism painting style, has died at 92.

The head of the Willi Sitte Foundation, Hans-Hubert Werner, told German news agency dpa that Sitte died on Saturday morning after a long illness.

Sitte's paintings depicted factory workers or farmers as glamorized ideals of Communist heroes. Among his famous works are voluptuous, often nude women.

He was the president of East Germany's association of visual artists from 1974 to 1988 and also a member of the ruling party's central committee. After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and Germany's unification, Sitte was seen in a more controversial light because of his closeness to the Communist regime.

[Associated Press]

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