The Donaueschinger Musiktage festival was inaugurated in the 1950s, which fundamentally changed listening habits (sound fields, so-called clusters, resonated in music). Developing in parallel were colour-field paintings, which dispensed with all representation.
In the world of music, Hans Werner Henze's opera The Young Lord was a triumph. At the same time, Egon Eiermann put forth a new design for the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church.
In terms of literature, Heinrich Böll and T.S. Eliot deserve mention, and Ingeborg Bachmann endorsed Existentialism with her cycles of poems.