Lot: 211
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
1880 Aschaffenburg - 1938 Davos
Sitzender Akt. Um 1909.
Watercolor.
With estate stamp of the Kunstmuseum Basel (Lugt 1570 b) on verso and the handwritten registration number "A Dre/Bg 20". On creme paper. 60 x 43 cm (23,6 x 16,9 in), the full sheet.

This work is documented in the Ernst Ludwig Kirchner Archiv, Wichtrach/Bern.

PROVENANCE: Private collection South Germany.

After completing his architecture course in Dresden, during which he became acquainted with Fritz Bleyl, Erich Heckel und Karl Schmidt-Rottluff and began to collaborate with them, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner opposed his father’s wishes and opted for painting as a career. The intensive exchange of ideas among the four friends led to the founding of the artist collective known as “Brücke” in 1905 with the aim of “attracting all forces fomenting revolution” (Schmidt-Rottluff). The artists started with “quarter-hour nudes”, drawing from the model in the studio or outdoors. At first the group was oriented towards Late Impressionism; however, the discovery of the Fauves, Oceanic art and van Gogh’s work induced the four painters to turn to Expressionism.
The principal motif for both Kirchner in his Dresden years and the other “Brücke” painters was the nude represented in free movement. Apart from representations of bathers, which he did while staying at the Moritzburg Lakes north of Dresden, the nude painted in the studio was a favourite with Kirchner in oil paintings and watercolors. He welcomed his fellow artists and models to his studio flat at 30 Berlinerstrasse, where he lived with Dodo from 1909. Her name was Doris Große and she would be the leading lady in Kirchner’s life and art from 1909 until 1911. When one compares the present work with verified representations of Dodo, for instance, in the painting “Dodo and Her Brothers”, it seems highly likely that our figure seated before a yellow ground was Kirchner’s celebrated Dresden beloved. The contours cast on the surface in broad black brush strokes are filled with uniform color surfaces in red, blue and yellow as they are in the woodcut. Here Kirchner has created a snapshot of the utmost intimacy and painterly brilliance in an Expressionist palette.
The group’s style was lastingly affected by an encounter with Italian Futurist art around 1910. It became “harsher”. Ernst Ludwig Kirchner moved to Berlin in 1911. The urban environment of a metropolis provided Kirchner with a wealth of fresh motifs, which he translated into simplified, crisply contoured forms, expressive qualities and lurid color contrasts. His urban pictures became Expressionist incunabula and made Ernst Ludwig Kirchner one of the most important German artists of the 20\up6 th century. In 1917 Ernst Ludwig Kirchner settled in Frauenkirch near Davos. His urban pictures were succeeded by mountain landscapes and representations of rural life. In 1923 Ernst Ludwig Kirchner moved into the “Haus auf dem Wildboden” at the head of the Sertig Valley, where he lived and worked until he took his own life in 1938. [JS].

Very good overall impression. Corners with isolated pinholes originating from the making. Sheet edges with few splits, partly skilfully restored.

EUR: 40.000 - 60.000 DIFF.(19%)
US$: 54.560 - 81.840