Lot 3229* - Z41 Impressionist & Modern Art - Friday, 02. December 2016, 02.00 PM
GABRIELE MÜNTER
(Berlin 1877–1962 Murnau)
Rotes Moos. 1959.
Oil on board.
Signed and dated lower left: Münter 59.
33 x 41 cm.
This work will be included in the Catalogue raisonné of paintings by Gabriele Münter, published by the Gabriele Münter and Johannes Eichner Foundation.
Provenance:
- Galerie Gunzenhauser, Munich.
- Private collection, Germany (bought in the 70s at the gallery above).
The work “Rotes Moos”, which Münter painted in her mature later period, consists of areas of colour harmoniously brought together. They depict a concrete, yet strongly abstracted landscape. Münter felt much more committed to the “concept of nature” than to abstraction, and found in the flat composition of the mountainous landscape, the absence of shadow and the contouring of individual areas, a fitting stylistic device, which is brought to bear splendidly in the present painting.
In her late work, Gabriele Münter consistently used motifs from the Blauer Reiter period. Thus, we are struck by how close “Rotes Moos” is in composition and colour to the painting “Seelandschaft mit drei Kugelbäumen” circa 1909. The blue mountain chain looms in the upper half of the picture and only appears to be separated from the green of the fields in the foreground by the red horizontal band of moss. The lack of spatial depth is replaced by the dominant colouring, so that the (dark) contours of the landscape elements are used only in a very targeted way. In many cases the areas of colour are placed directly alongside one another, or they are separated by the shimmering ground colour.
“Rotes Moos” reverberates splendidly with Münter’s art and skill, whereby the radical position of her early years has yielded to an inner harmony, which in the luminosity and interplay of colours gives witness to an intensity, which characterises Münter’s work in her best years.
Provenance:
- Galerie Gunzenhauser, Munich.
- Private collection, Germany (bought in the 70s at the gallery above).
The work “Rotes Moos”, which Münter painted in her mature later period, consists of areas of colour harmoniously brought together. They depict a concrete, yet strongly abstracted landscape. Münter felt much more committed to the “concept of nature” than to abstraction, and found in the flat composition of the mountainous landscape, the absence of shadow and the contouring of individual areas, a fitting stylistic device, which is brought to bear splendidly in the present painting.
In her late work, Gabriele Münter consistently used motifs from the Blauer Reiter period. Thus, we are struck by how close “Rotes Moos” is in composition and colour to the painting “Seelandschaft mit drei Kugelbäumen” circa 1909. The blue mountain chain looms in the upper half of the picture and only appears to be separated from the green of the fields in the foreground by the red horizontal band of moss. The lack of spatial depth is replaced by the dominant colouring, so that the (dark) contours of the landscape elements are used only in a very targeted way. In many cases the areas of colour are placed directly alongside one another, or they are separated by the shimmering ground colour.
“Rotes Moos” reverberates splendidly with Münter’s art and skill, whereby the radical position of her early years has yielded to an inner harmony, which in the luminosity and interplay of colours gives witness to an intensity, which characterises Münter’s work in her best years.
CHF 100 000 / 150 000 | (€ 103 090 / 154 640)
Sold for CHF 120 500 (including buyer’s premium)
All information is subject to change.