Lot 3226* - A207 Impressionist & Modern Art - Friday, 01. December 2023, 04.30 PM
EMIL NOLDE
(Nolde 1867–1956 Seebüll)
Mountain lake. 1948.
Watercolour on Japan paper.
Signed lower right: Nolde.
26.5 × 45.6 cm.
The work is registered at the archive of the Nolde-Foundation Seebüll under number Fr.A.1030.
Certificate:
Dr Martin Urban, Seebüll, 14.9.1975.
Provenance:
- Private collection, Flensburg.
- Private collection, Switzerland, by descent from the above collection.
Nolde's connection to Switzerland dates back to January 1892, when at the age of 24, he began an apprenticeship as a commercial artist at the Museum of Industrial and Applied Arts in St. Gallen. He recalled always the dramatic quality of the nature there and regularly returned to Switzerland in later years to visit friends and enjoy the landscape.
The massifs of the Swiss mountains made a lasting impression on the artist. Nolde not only painted them, but wanted to experience them in all their variety: “Once in my thoughts and dreams they appeared to me, enormous like giants and giantesses; then again I stood in front of them, armed with ice axes and glacier spurs, as an almost indomitable reality.” (Nolde Foundation Seebüll, 2009, p. 60). As he grew older, Nolde often sought refuge in Switzerland with his wife Ada for health reasons. The nature and the air had a beneficial effect on their souls and lungs.
Andreas Fluck has stated that "During his many sojourns in Switzerland, Nolde did not paint a single oil painting ... presumably he did not consider oils to be a suitable medium to express the way he saw and felt the beauty of the Swiss mountains." (Fluck, 2010, pp. 18–19).
His wife Ada finally died in 1948. Nolde married again and the honeymoon took him to Switzerland one last time. The present watercolor “Mountain Lake” was created on this final journey. Using his masterful technique of wet-on-wet watercolor painting, Nolde conjured here for the last time a colorful and wonderfully harmonious depiction of a Swiss mountain landscape.
Certificate:
Dr Martin Urban, Seebüll, 14.9.1975.
Provenance:
- Private collection, Flensburg.
- Private collection, Switzerland, by descent from the above collection.
Nolde's connection to Switzerland dates back to January 1892, when at the age of 24, he began an apprenticeship as a commercial artist at the Museum of Industrial and Applied Arts in St. Gallen. He recalled always the dramatic quality of the nature there and regularly returned to Switzerland in later years to visit friends and enjoy the landscape.
The massifs of the Swiss mountains made a lasting impression on the artist. Nolde not only painted them, but wanted to experience them in all their variety: “Once in my thoughts and dreams they appeared to me, enormous like giants and giantesses; then again I stood in front of them, armed with ice axes and glacier spurs, as an almost indomitable reality.” (Nolde Foundation Seebüll, 2009, p. 60). As he grew older, Nolde often sought refuge in Switzerland with his wife Ada for health reasons. The nature and the air had a beneficial effect on their souls and lungs.
Andreas Fluck has stated that "During his many sojourns in Switzerland, Nolde did not paint a single oil painting ... presumably he did not consider oils to be a suitable medium to express the way he saw and felt the beauty of the Swiss mountains." (Fluck, 2010, pp. 18–19).
His wife Ada finally died in 1948. Nolde married again and the honeymoon took him to Switzerland one last time. The present watercolor “Mountain Lake” was created on this final journey. Using his masterful technique of wet-on-wet watercolor painting, Nolde conjured here for the last time a colorful and wonderfully harmonious depiction of a Swiss mountain landscape.
CHF 80 000 / 120 000 | (€ 82 470 / 123 710)
Sold for CHF 93 750 (including buyer’s premium)
All information is subject to change.