The cycle of 27 lithographs on the Apocalypse of St. John created by Max Beckmann in his Dutch exile in 1941 inspired Benjamin Schweitzer to compose 27 musical ‘sheets’ as well. ‘The pictures are filled with an immediate aggressiveness and, at the same time, often with a strangely reserved symbolism.’ Some of the parts can be played in varying order, ‘almost like one can look at a cycle of pictures in chronological, systematic or random order.’ (Benjamin Schweitzer)