The eminent German graphic artist Käthe Kollwitz, one of the greatest portrait artists of the 20th c., championed the vulnerable, poor and despairing; she was the artistic patron saint of mother and child, of the outcast and downtrodden and of the neglected, whose lives constantly hung in the balance. Her art was the art of social conscience. Ralf Gawlick’s Kollwitz-Konnex (…im Frieden seiner Hände), a song cycle for soprano and guitar, is based on passages selected from Kollwitz’ diary and letters, linked to nine of her self-portraits spanning her entire creative life. It is a large and multifaceted Konnex: an interaction between self-portraits, the past and present, the artist and society, and not least Kollwitz’ art and the composer, whose music is so profoundly influenced by her art. This composer-supervised recording features soprano Anne Harley and virtuoso guitarist, Eliot Fisk, the dedicatees of the work.