Josef Scharl

Mockery / - Desk Perpetrators -

1964

Walter Helbig (1878 Falkenstein - 1968 Ascona), Adoration of the Magi, 1918. Hand-colored linocut, 30 cm x 22.5 cm (depiction), 50 cm x 35 cm (sheet size), signed “W.[alter] Helbig” ...

Georg Tappert (1880 Berlin - 1957 Berlin), The Mother, 1918 (1964). Estate print from 1964. Linocut on Japan, 31.5 cm x 20 cm (image), 44.5 cm x 28 cm (sheet size), marked lower left...

Georg Tappert (1880 Berlin - 1957 Berlin), Head, 1918 (1964). Wietek 110. Estate print from 1964. Linocut on Japan, 17 cm x 24.5 cm (depiction), 24 cm x 31.5 cm (sheet size), marked ...

Lovis Corinth (1858 Tapiau - 1925 Zandvoort), Rudolf von Rittner as Florian Geyer, 1924 (Müller 854), drypoint signed in pencil. 20.4 × 14.2 (plate size), 37.7 × 30.6 cm (sheet size). Published by Karl Nierendorf, Berlin. Framed in a passepartout. - Strong, precise impression. Frame a little bit rubbed and with two small damages. About the artwork The knight is a leitmotif in Lovis Corinth's work, culminating in his Self-Portrait in Armour of 1914. Of all the paintings on this theme, Corinth most often depicted Florian Geyer. Descended from a Franconian noble family, he fought for the freedom of the peasants during the peasant wars of the Reformation, first diplomatically and then militarily, leading the legendary Schwarzen Haufen (Black Troops). The name derives from the black uniforms with which Geyer dressed the peasants willing to fight. During the Napoleonic occupation, the freedom fighter Florian Geyer was sung about by the Romantics, and the free corps Die Schwarze Schaar, founded in 1813 by Major von Lützow, succeeded the Schwarzer Haufen. It was against this historical background that Gerhard Hauptmann wrote the revolutionary drama Florian Geyer, which premiered at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin in 1896. While the actor Rudolf Rittner, who would later appear in Fritz Lang's films, initially played the role of Schäferhans, he took over the leading role in the new production at Berlin's Lessing Theatre in 1904, again directed by Emil Lessing, which established his fame as an actor. Hauptmann himself praised the acting. He wrote to Hugo von Hofmannsthal: "It went quite well with Florian Geyer. In any case, I had the great pleasure of seeing the play again in an admirable performance". And Lovis Corinth was so taken with Rittner's performance that he painted an oil portrait of him in the role of Florian Geyer in 1906. After two further graphic versions in 1915 and 1920/21, Corinth returned to the painting a year before his death and almost twenty years after the oil painting to create this graphic version in 1924. Even the inscription in the picture was taken over. This proves all the more the importance of the knight and freedom fighter for Corinth's self-image. The oil painting, in particular, proclaims the single-minded determination to fight to the last for the values defended, manifested in the oil painting by the tattered flag held out to the enemy. There is a parallel with Rainer Maria Rilke's 1899 story The Cornet, in which the protagonist goes down with the flag that he first saved at the risk of his life. Consequently, the portrait is also a self-portrait, and the knight's armour is not an academic costume or an ironic refraction, but an expression of Corinth's self-image, which also includes his self-representation as an artist. The Secession poster...

This 11.5" X 10.5" unframed mixed media pastel and ink etching on paper by Josette Simon Gestin is from the artist's series titled "No way back." On the ...

Bold print of "Brotherhood" by Kathe Kollwitz (German, 1867-1945). This piece is one of the Lithographic reproductions of the original lithographs, plate 3 from a series of 10, print...

Koloman Moser (1868 –1918), AUSTRIAN Instead of applying his flair and art education solely to painting, Koloman Moser embodied the idea of Gesamt Kunstwerk (all-embracing art work) by designing architecture, furniture, jewelry, graphics, and tapestries meant to coordinate every detail of an environment. His work transcended the imitative decorative arts of earlier eras and helped to define Modernism for generations to come. Moser achieved a remarkable balance between intellectual structure (often geometric) and hedonistic luxury. Collaborating with Gustav Klimt and Josef Hoffmann, the artist was an editor and active contributor to Ver Sacrum, (Sacred Spring), the journal of the Viennese Secession that was so prized for its aesthetics and high quality production that it was considered a work of art. The magazine featured drawings and designs in the Jugendstil style (Youth) along with literary contributions from distinguished writers from across Europe. It quickly disseminated both the spirit and the style of the Secession. In 1903 Moser and Hoffmann founded and led the Wiener Werkstatte (Viennese Workshop) a collective of artisans that produced elegant decorative arts items, not as industrial prototypes but for the purpose of sale to the public. The plan, as idealistic then as now, was to elevate the lives of consumers by means of beautiful and useful interior surroundings. Moser’s influence has endured throughout the century. His design sensibility is evident from the mid-century modern furniture of the 1950s and ‘60s to the psychedelic rock posters...

Judith I, no. 9 from the second installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts Much like his treatment of the Classical personage, Danae, from Greek mythology, Klimt’s depiction of Judith takes an Old Testament character, a heroine who avenges the death of her husband by killing an Assyrian king, and firmly positions her in his present-day Vienna. His multicolored collotype rips the canvas from its gilded frame which directly references the subject with its title: “Judith und Holofernes”. Now in print form, Judith, holding the severed head of a male in murky shadow, is the ultimate Viennese femme fatale. Her likeness is unmistakably similar to a former lover of Klimt’s and famous Viennese soprano, Anna von Mildenburg. Though his allusion to ancient Assyria is apt, Klimt literally lifted the gold patterned background’s design motif from a relief detail from Sennacherib’s Palace displayed in a London museum. His context then is contemporary. In a sensual and sexually powerful tour de force, Klimt’s Judith...