The Climb

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Hans Hofmann
The Climb
1960

About the Item

"The Climb" is a painting by Hans Hofmann. The painting is signed lower right, "Hans Hofmann 60" and inscribed verso, "Cat. #1463 the climb 84 x 48 1960 hans hofmann". The framed piece measures 85 x 48 3/4 x 2 in. No artist bridged the gap between European Modernism and American Abstract Expressionism the same way Hans Hofmann did. The reason is simple. He was trained in Parisian academies prior to World War I and was friendly with Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, and, most significantly, Robert and Sonia Delaunay. Conversely, his endeavors as a teacher and later, as a mature artist in full command of his abilities were stimulated — made possible even — by the exhilarating New York milieu that gave rise to Abstract Expressionism. So perhaps it is not surprising that unlike most of the Abstract Expressionists who pursued a single iconographic look — Rothko’s soft-edged rectangles, Franz Klein’s enlarged calligraphic strokes, Clyfford Still’s dark, ragged shapes — Hofmann was constantly reaching for different and contradictory effects. That meant his paintings were wildly varied and that they carved a wide swath toward the most exciting avenues available to contemporary abstraction. Hofmann proved to be a gallant experimenter, refusing to settle on a single style for long. The Climb was painted in 1960 at a time when most American painters were pushing abstraction in new directions. Not surprisingly, as an outlier, it does not evoke Hofmann’s usual “push and pull’ technique. But it is very much a painting of its time, marked by a sensuousness and a deft, painterly touch. It suggests what Irving Sandler characterized as Hofmann’s hedonistic touch, an optimistic celebration of the lyrical abstraction that overcame the burning darkness of painting in the 40s and trumped even the lighter palette of Pollock or Pousette-Dart that emerged later. While the passages of The Climb are brushed rather than poured or stained, it reflects the delicate lyricism of his former student, Helen Frankenthaler who, since 1952 had experimented with floating areas of color, absorbed into the canvas with watercolor-like ease. She, in turn, had inspired a generation of Color Field painters including Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland. On the other hand, these short bands and prismatic slurries recall those halcyon days in Paris when Hofmann worked through color theory with his good friend Robert Delaunay and thought a lot about prisms. Hofmann not only retained elements of Synthetic Cubism, but the lessons he learned from the Fauves and the artists who verily invented abstraction, Wassily Kandinsky, Kasimir Malevich, Frantisek Kupka, and Piet Mondrian to name a few of the key players. The Climb is a glorious expression of a painter drawing from both the past and the present, painting in a playful, but not frivolous manner fully informed and prepared to express his abilities as a painter, simply, and with great conviction. Provenance: Estate of the artist Renate, Hans, and Maris Hofmann Trust, 1996, acquired from the above Private Collection Private Collection, acquired from the above Exhibition: Florida, Naples Museum of Art, Hans Hofmann: A Retrospective, 1 November-21 March 2003, no. 48, illustrated in color University Park, Pennsylvania State University, Palmer Museum of Art, Presentation in Galleries, 7 June 2007-10 October 2009 (temporary loan) Art in Embassies Program, Washington D.C., United States Ambassador's Residence, Luxembourg Literature: Exhibition Catalogue: Florida, Naples Museum of Art, Hans Hofmann: A Retrospective, 2003, no. 48, illustrated in color L. Adams, The Making and Meaning of Art, London, 2006, no. 64, pp. 110-11, illustrated in color S. Villager, ed., Hans Hofmann: A Catalogue Raisonne of the Paintings, vol. III, Farnham, Surrey and Burlington, Vermont, 2014, no. P1267, p. 267, illustrated in color

Creator:
Hans Hofmann (1880-1966, German)
Creation Year:
1960
Dimensions:
Height: 84 in (213.36 cm)Width: 47.5 in (120.65 cm)
Medium:
Oil,Panel
Movement & Style:
Abstract Expressionist
Period:
1960-1969
Condition:
Gallery Location:
Palm Desert, CA
Reference Number:
Seller: 425761stDibs: LU9311534912