Items Similar to Lilith and the Snake, Oil on canvas femme fatale mythical portrait, Signed
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 6
George Von HoesslinLilith and the Snake, Oil on canvas femme fatale mythical portrait, Signed
About the Item
Oil on canvas, signed lower left
Image size: 16 x 15 3/4 inches (40.5 x 40 cm)
Original gilt frame
Provenance
From the estate of the prominent art collector Leon Zielinski
This is a painting of the mythic figure Lilith. Born by the hand of the Creator, and shaped from impure clay, which influenced her demonic nature, she is punished and condemned to see her offspring die. Thirsty for revenge, she takes the form of the snake of temptation and incites Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. Abel is also a victim of Lilith’s perversity as she leads Caïn to commit fratricide.
Here, Lilith appears in all of her sensuality as she stares directly at the snake that is twisted firmly around her - a snake that she does not fear, and whose form, according to Jewish mythology, she takes to pervert her victims. The snake coiled around her makes them both appear as one, the line where one ends and the other begins is blurred.
Her luminous and milky skin detaches from the background and focuses our attention entirely on her fatal beauty. The juxtaposition of the scaly snake wrapped around Lilith's luminous flesh emphasises the physical difference between the two. Far from the religious depiction of the demoness, the artist then offers a nearly provocative image by depicting the perfect mix between calm and sensuality for such a sinful figure.
This subject was also famously explored by the Pre-Raphaelites in such works as the 1887 painting by the artist John Collier and the 1868 poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti entitled 'Lilith, or Body's Beauty'.
George von Hoesslin
George von Hoesslin came from an aristocratic Augsburg background. He grew up in the United States, where he trained as a merchant. However he moved back to Germany in 1871 to enroll at the Academy of Art in Munich. Rapidly disillusioned with the teaching methods of the Academy, he broke off his studies, determined to further his skills independently. He visited Italy for the first time in 1875.
Munich was to remain his permanent base – it was here that he would produce most of his finished paintings. Over the following forty years he made extended annual trips to Italy. He rented a studio in Rome which he kept on until 1911. The city was to provide an important source of artistic stimuli. He also developed an increasing interest in landscape. He travelled widely throughout Italy, often on lengthy study trips by bicycle. Landscape remained his chief interest throughout his artistic career.
Hoesslin’s lifelong output of history paintings, allegorical subjects and portraits provided him with a regular source of income and secured public recognition of his art at major exhibitions. However his real talents lay in landscape painting. He produced a large body of studies sur le motif which served as the basis for monumental landscapes worked up later in the studio. Many of these compositions are devoid of figures. Titles like The Rock of Medusa and Homeric Coastline, with their references to classical literature, underline his intention not to achieve topographical accuracy but to conjure up mysterious Böcklinesque associations with the myths and legends of antiquity. Even in a non-imaginary or real landscape like the View of the Villa Spinola in the Bay of Genoa topographical accuracy is subordinated to a contemplative, almost poetic mood of melancholy.
- Creator:George Von Hoesslin (1851 - 1923, German, American)
- Dimensions:Height: 16 in (40.64 cm)Width: 14 in (35.56 cm)
- More Editions & Sizes:1 of 1Price: $18,556
- Medium:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:London, GB
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU52413384702
About the Seller
5.0
Vetted Seller
These experienced sellers undergo a comprehensive evaluation by our team of in-house experts.
Established in 2007
1stDibs seller since 2014
63 sales on 1stDibs
Typical response time: 4 hours
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: London, United Kingdom
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 14 days of delivery.
More From This SellerView All
- Portrait of a Sleeping Woman Original Oil Painting Modern BritishBy Lionel EllisLocated in London, GBLionel Ellis 1903 - 1988 Portrait of a Sleeping Woman Oil on canvas Image size: 14 x 18 inches (35.5 x 45.5cm) Framed Lionel Ellis ARCA (1903-1988) was a...Category
20th Century Portrait Paintings
MaterialsOil, Canvas
- Self PortraitBy Gerald Goddard JacksonLocated in London, GBGerald Goddard Jackson 1878-1941 Self Portrait Oil on canvas Image size: 23½ x 19½ inches Original frame Jackson was born at Duddington, Northamptonshire on 5 March 1878. He enrolled at the Slade School of Art in 1893 where he studied alongside fellow students Wyndham Lewis, Orpen, Gertler, Nash and Nevinson. He left the Slade in 1899 in order to travel to Canada, USA and Mexico, spending three years in Italy. In 1911, he joined the Army. Upon the outbreak of the First World War, his battalion was sent to France. He was captured in 1916 and was held at various German prisoner of war camps, largely at Schwarmstedt in Saxony. Whilst in captivity he befriended the poet Frederick William Harvey...Category
20th Century Portrait Paintings
MaterialsOil, Canvas
- Self Portrait, Early 17th Century Italian Oil PaintingLocated in London, GBOil on canvas Image size: 27 ½ x 22 ½ inches (70 x 57 cm) Hand made gilt frame This fine 18th century work is after the original in the Uffizi Palace, Florence. Spada depicts himsel...Category
Early 17th Century Italian School Portrait Paintings
MaterialsOil, Canvas
- Self Portrait, 20th Century Female Artist Oil PaintingBy Joan Fairfax Whiteside ARRC FMAALocated in London, GBOil on canvas Image size: 17 3/4 x 13 inches (45 x 33 cm) Contemporary hand made frame and oval mount The Artist Joan Fairfax Whiteside was a prodigious artist and illustrator. Bor...Category
Mid-20th Century English School Portrait Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Self-Portrait - Photo-realism, oil, contemporaryBy Jeremy AndrewsLocated in London, GBJeremy Andrews Born 1974 Self Portrait Oil on canvas, signed Image size: 10 x 14 inches Framed Jeremy Andrews works in oils and uses traditional techniques such as under painti...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Self Portrait, 20th Century Female Artist Oil PaintingBy Joan Fairfax Whiteside ARRC FMAALocated in London, GBOil on canvas, on board Image size: 10 3/4 x 12 inches (27.25 x 30.5 cm) Original frame The Artist Joan Fairfax Whiteside was a prodigious artist and illustrator. Born into an emin...Category
20th Century Modern Portrait Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil, Board
You May Also Like
- Oil Painting Portrait, attributed to John Vanderbank (1694-1739)By John VanderbankLocated in Uppingham, GBOil Painting Portrait of John Campbell, 4th Duke of Argyll,, att to John Vanderbank (1694-1739) Housed in a swept frame which has been restored after photo. Canvas Size 50" x 40", Fr...Category
1690s Old Masters Portrait Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Woman with Lobsters / "Femme et Homards"By Andre MinauxLocated in Berlin, MDAndre Minaux (French 1923 - 1986) "Femme et Homards" / Woman with Lobsters. Oil on canvas. Features a young woman holding one lobster while two others sit on a counter before her. ...Category
Mid-20th Century French School Portrait Paintings
MaterialsCotton Canvas, Oil
- Contemporary Fabulous Portrait of The Queen with Detailed Royal Crown/JewelsBy Nancy LambLocated in Fort Worth, TXNancy Lamb (American, born 1956), sculptor and painter. Formally trained at Texas Christian University and the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History, whe...Category
2010s American Realist Figurative Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Acrylic, Oil
- Diana (Spencer), Princess of Wales. From The Series "All About Eve"By Annie KevansLocated in New York, NYListing includes framing with UV plexi, free shipping to the continental US and a 14-day return policy. Diana (Spencer), Princess of Wales from the series “All About Eve...Category
2010s Contemporary Portrait Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil, Archival Paper
- Garçon avec des Fruit - Boy with Fruit - Oil on Canvas - Naive PaintingBy Nino GiuffridaLocated in Meinisberg, CHNino Giuffrida (Sicilian, 1924, active in France) Un Garçon avec des Fruits • Oil on canvas, ca. 41 x 33 cm • Frame, made by the renowned framer Knöll from Zürich, ca. 54 x 46 cm • Signed top left Born in 1924 in Sicily, Nino already attended the artistic high school in Catania at the age of 17, where he befriended fellow painters including Pippo Aleo and Giovanni Calogero. At that time, he painted with passion everything he saw, landscapes, seascapes, still lifes. After a first attempt to come to France with his friend Giovanni in 1948, aborted for lack of a visa. Nino finally arrived at the Gare de Lyon on December 8, 1949 and settled at number 30 rue Gabrielle in Montmartre. Nino began to paint Paris. Like many Montmartre artists of this period, while he painted all day long, he moved about in the evening on the terraces of the cafés of Montmartre and Saint-Germain-des-Prés to transform himself into a portrait painter and randomly sketch the customers in restaurants. Nino then devoted himself more and more to the painting of children, which became his favorite theme of inspiration. Pierre Imbourg, journalist and art critic, wrote of him: "Montmartre, the land of little ‘Poulbots’, inspiring Nino to record in his mind all these childrens faces whose intense facial expression he would endevour to reproduce". It was also at this time that his career as a Montmartre painter influenced by cubism began. With the disappearance of the art galleries in Montmartre, Nino decides to settle on the French Riviera, in Cannes then in Vallauris. From 1952 his personal exhibitions follow one another and Nino becomes an international painter: Rome, Brussels, Chicago, Copenhagen, Helsingborg and Aüs in Sweden, in Geneva, in Kourou in Guyana... In Paris, he manages the Galerie de la Colonne...Category
Mid-20th Century Other Art Style Figurative Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Stanza n.2Located in Milano, MIThe theme of "La Stanza" ("the Room"), from which the exhibition takes the title, wants to resume intimacy and introspection that only a domestic environment manages to give. The wal...Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil