Sale: 525 / Evening Sale, Dec. 10. 2021 in Munich Lot 261

 

261
Andy Warhol
Goethe, 1982.
Silkscreen in colors
Estimate:
€ 40,000 / $ 43,200
Sold:
€ 187,500 / $ 202,500

(incl. surcharge)
Goethe. 1982.
Silkscreen in colors.
Feldmann/Schellmann/Defendi II.271. Signed and numbered. From an edition of 100 copies. On Lenox Museum Board. 96.5 x 96.5 cm (37.9 x 37.9 in), the full sheet.
Sheet 2 from the portfolio of a total of 4 color silkscreens. Printed by Rupert Jasen Smith, New York (with the blindstamp). Published by Editionen Schellmann & Klüser, Munich/New York, in cooperation with Denise René/Hans Mayer, Düsseldorf (with the copyright stamp on the reverse).
• This version of the "Goethe" suite has the strongest colors of all versions.
• An icon of world literature portrayed by Warhol.
• Tischbein as a cult motif of Pop-Art
.

PROVENANCE: Private collection Southern Germany (since 1992).

LITERATURE: Ketterer Kunst, Munich, 172nd auction, lot 1264.
Forty are better than one. Edition Schellmann 1969-2009, published by Jörg Schellmann, Ostfildern 2009, pp. 342-343.



The eyes tired, the rucksack on the back, the jacket does not fit well - apparently one of the numerous tourists who have their photos taken in front of Tischbein's famous painting "Goethe in der römischen Campagna". In 1981, the photographer Barbara Klemm captured Andy Warhol in front of the work that had served him as inspiration for his portrait of the German poet a year earlier. A portrait commission from the publisher Siegfried Unseld took the pop artist to Frankfurt am Main in 1980. Together with his client, Warhol visited the Städel Museum, where Unseld suggested to creatie a variation of Tischbein's painting. Based on a photo, the "court painter of the 70s", as art historian Robert Rosenblum calls Warhol, (cf. Robert Rosenblum, Andy Warhol: The Court Painter of the Seventies, in: Exhib. Cat. Andy Warhol, portraits, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney 1993; Anthony d'Offay Gallery, London 1994, Munich 1993), transforms the portrait of Goethe into a trendy modernist portrait. He adds graphic elements to his screen printing process, increasing the motif by a painterly surface structure and the unmistakable artistic signature. The concentration on the face with the accompanying oversizing, stages Goethe's face in a striking way and thus follows Tischbein's original intention to pay particular attention to the face. At the time, he wrote in a letter to Johann Caspar Lavater: "I want to draw his face very accurately and true. You can hardly see a happier and more expressive head [sic]" (quoted from: Jonas Fränkel (ed.), Goethes Briefe an Charlotte von Stein, vol. 5: commentary / register, Berlin 1962, pp. 199f.). [CE / SM]



261
Andy Warhol
Goethe, 1982.
Silkscreen in colors
Estimate:
€ 40,000 / $ 43,200
Sold:
€ 187,500 / $ 202,500

(incl. surcharge)