Die rote Nase, 13. Februar 1983. 1983.
Watercolor and gouache over pencil.
With the artist's signature and the date “13 2 83” on the right. Signed and inscribed “Horst Janssen Sønderjyllands Kunstmuseum Tønder” at the bottom. On glassine. 54.9 x 38.6 cm (21.6 x 15.1 in), size of sheet.
The work serves as a template for a poster, published by St. Gertrude, Galerie St. Gertrude, Hamburg. [CH].

• Horst Janssen is one of the great German graphic artists of the second half of the 20th century.
• His apt, often ironic portraits are among the most important motifs of his entire oeuvre.
• International breakthrough: In 1980, the Art Institute of Chicago and the Busch-Reisinger Museum (Harvard Art Museums), Cambridge, held solo exhibitions of his drawings and graphic works (followed by a traveling exhibition through several American museums).
• In 1982 Janssen participated in the Venice Biennale for the second time
.

PROVENANCE: Pia Zadora Collection, Los Angeles.
From a Swiss collection.

LITERATURE: Dierk Lemcke (ed.), Horst Janssen: Selbstbildnis 1945-1993. Neugier, Variation, Balance, Verwandlung, Angeber X, Paranoia, Manipulation, Groteske, Hamburg 1994, cat. no. 168 (with a full-page illu. in color).

"Janssen [is] not only an overbearingly charismatic genius actor, but also a draughtsman and etcher of undeniable originality."
From an article in “Der Spiegel”, on the occasion of the publication of the first Horst Janssen biography, October 7, 1984, Der Spiegel 41/1984.

"He left behind such an enormous and bizarre, but also eloquent oeuvre that two lives of 65 years each would hardly have been enough."
Rudolf Augstein, journalist, publisher and founder of "Der Spiegel" after Horst Janssen's death in 1995.