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From a vantage point on the opposite side of the harbour basin, Franz Radziwill took in the Wilhelmshaven shipyard. Behind a cluster of haphazardly grouped houses and warehouses, four black cranes rise up, looming monumentally and heavily over the industrial site. He reproduced their net-like iron construction with the utmost precision. Only a few people populate this surreal scene. The bright blue sky and sun-drenched shoreline contrast starkly with the shabby houses and the distorted image on the menacingly dark water surface. Radziwill refused to engage in any structured analysis of the technology and architecture, focusing solely on the external appearance with demonstrative indifference.

What is remarkable about Radziwill's paintings is the devotion to detail with which he captured his subjects using an old master technique, thereby objectifying them to a high degree. The view of Wilhelmshaven is thus one of the early examples of so-called 'magical realism' in New Objectivity painting.