Symbolist Art
to
241
553
93
142
44
59
Overall Width
to
Overall Height
to
1
101
626
166
22
103
111
92
13
13
23
18
48
12
101,067
57,692
51,638
25,313
12,367
8,518
5,895
5,469
4,082
2,782
2,055
1,853
1,834
660
578
248
53
536
331
224
176
165
107
94
55
45
45
38
38
33
30
25
25
21
20
19
19
254
191
155
146
110
96
42
38
37
34
107
432
534
200
Style: Symbolist
Returnable Items Only
Christophorus II - Lithograph by Hans Thoma - 1916
By Hans Thoma 1
Located in Roma, IT
Lithograph realized by Hans Thoma in 1916 on light yellow paper.
Date and monogrammed in the plate.
Hand signed lower right.
Very good condition.
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
Materials
Lithograph
Óleo sobre cartón - Paisaje
Located in Sant Celoni, ES
Firmado en la parte inferior
Estado de conservación bueno
Se presenta bien enmarcada la obra
Medidas de la obra: 22 x 30 cm.
Medidas del marco: 40 x 48 cm.
:::::::::::::::::::::...
Category
1940s Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
21st century Tuscan figurative painting of mythological theme oil on canvas
Located in Florence, IT
The painting is entitled Arion of Metimna, a poet and cantor of 6th-century B.C. Greece. C., a figure straddling the historical and the mythical. In particular, depicted here is the ...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Message Intime
Located in OPOLE, PL
Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) - Intime Mitteilung (Message intime)
Etching and aquatint in color from 1925.
The editon of 52/300.
Dimensions of work: 57 x 45 cm.
Monnogramed and ...
Category
1950s Symbolist Art
Materials
Watercolor, Etching
$2,723 Sale Price
20% Off
Menashe Kadishman, Sheep head with crown, Acrylic on canvas
Located in Tel Aviv, IL
Menashe Kadishman, Sheep head, Symbolist painting, colored painting, Israeli art, Israeli art
Category
1980s Symbolist Art
Materials
Acrylic
"Harlequin and his dog", 20th Century oil on cardbard by Ismael de la Serna
Located in Madrid, ES
ISMAEL GONZÁLEZ DE LA SERNA
Spanish, 1898 - 1968
HARLEQUIN AND HIS DOG
Signed and dated I. de la Serna, 1955
Oil on cardboard
42 X 27-1/2 i...
Category
1950s Symbolist Art
Materials
Cardboard, Oil
"Asceticism" Figurative Painting 16" x 30" inch by Ahmed Saber
By Ahmed Saber
Located in Culver City, CA
"Asceticism" Figurative Painting 16" x 30" inch by Ahmed Saber
Color Pencil and Acrylic on Paper.
AHMED SABER - BIO
Ahmed Saber is an Egyptian artist based in Luxor in Upper Egypt,...
Category
21st Century and Contemporary Symbolist Art
Materials
Gold Leaf
"Retreat from Marignano" set of 3 Copper Plate Prints
Located in Palm Beach, FL
The three prints included in this set are: "Retreat from Marignano", "Retreat from Marignano (left panel)", "Retreat from Marignano (right panel)".
2018 marks the centenary anniversary of Ferdinand Hodler’s death. In that 100 years time, the art world’s esteem of this important artist has proved fickle. It has shifted from extolling his artistic merits during his lifetime to showing something of a feigned disdain- more reflective of the world political order than a true change of heart for Hodler’s work. After years of Hodler being all but a footnote in the annals of art history and generally ignored, finally, the pendulum has righted itself once again. Recent retrospective exhibitions in Europe and the United States have indicated not only a joyful rediscovery of Hodler’s art but a firm conviction that his work and world view hold particular relevance today. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is not only a collection of printed work reflecting the best of all of his painted work created up to 1914 just before the outbreak of World War I, the portfolio itself is an encapsulation of Hodler’s ethos, Parallelisme.
Hodler developed his philosophy of Parallelisme as a unifying approach to art which strips away detail in search of harmony. By means of abstraction, symmetry and repetition, Hodler sought ways to depict Nature’s essence and her fundamental, universal order. He believed these universal laws governing the natural, observable world extend to the spiritual realm. Symbolist in nature with Romantic undertones, his works are equally portraits of these universal concepts and feelings governing all life as they are a visual portrait in the formal sense. Whether his subject is a solitary tree, a moment in battle, mortal fear, despair, the awe inspired by a vast mountain range, a tender moment or even the collective conviction in a belief, Hodler unveils this guiding principle of Parallelisme.
Several aspects of Hodler’s portfolio reinforce his tenets of Parallelisme. The Table of Contents clearly preferences a harmonious design over detail. The two columns, consisting of twenty lines each, list the images by order of appearance using their German titles. The abbreviated titles are somewhat cryptic in that they obscure the identities of the sitters. Like the image Hodler presents, they are distillations of the sitter without any extraneous details. This shortening was also done in an effort to maintain a harmonious symmetry of the Table of Contents, themselves, and keep titles to a one-line limit. The twenty-fourth title: “Bildnis des Schweizerischen Gesandten C.” was so long, even with abbreviation, that it required two lines; so, for the sake of maintaining symmetry, the fortieth title: “Bauernmadchen” was omitted from the list. This explains why the images are not numbered. Hodler’s reasoning is not purely esoteric. Symmetry and pattern reach beyond mere formal design principles. Finding sameness and imposing it over disorder goes to the root of Hodler’s identity and his art. A Swiss native, Hodler was bi-lingual and spoke German and French. Each printed image, even number forty, have titles in both of Hodler’s languages. Certainly, there was a market for Hodler’s work among francophones and this inclusion may have been a polite gesture to that end; however, this is the only place in the portfolio which includes French. With German titles at the lower left of each image, Hodler’s name at bottom center and corresponding French titles at the lower right of each image, there is a harmony and symmetry woven into all aspects of the portfolio. This holds true for the page design, as it applies to each printed image and as it describes the Swiss artist himself. Seen in this light, Hodler’s portfolio of printed work is the epitome of Hodler’s Parallelisme. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is also one of the most significant documents to best tell the story of how Hodler, from Switzerland, became caught between political cross-hairs and how the changing tides of nations directly impacted the artist during his lifetime as well as the accessibility of his art for generations to come.
The Munich-based publisher of the portfolio, R. Piper & Co., Verlag, plays a crucial role in this story. Publishing on a wide range of subjects from philosophy and world religion to music, literature and the visual arts; the publisher’s breadth of inquiry within any one genre was equal in scope. Their marketing strategy to publish multiple works on Hodler offers great insight as to what a hot commodity Hodler was at that time. R.Piper & Co.’s Almanach, which they published in 1914 in commemoration of their first ten years in business, clearly illustrates the rapid succession- strategically calculated for achieving the deepest and broadest impact - in which they released three works on Hodler to hit the market by the close of 1914. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was their premier publication. It preceded C.A. Loosli’s Die Zeichnungen Ferdinand Hodlers, a print portfolio after 50 drawings by Hodler which was released in Autumn of 1914 at the mid-level price-point of 75-150 Marks; and a third less expensive collection of prints after original works by Hodler, which had not been included in either of the first two portfolios, was released at the end of that year entitled Ferdinand Hodler by Dr. Ewald Bender.
The title and timing of DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS' debut leaves little doubt as to the connection it has with another avant-garde portfolio of art prints, Das Werk Gustav Klimts, released in 5 installments from 1908 -1914 by Galerie Miethke in Vienna. Hodler, himself, was involved in Klimt’s ground-breaking project. As the owner of Klimt’s 1901 painting, “Judith with the Head of Holifernes” which appears as the ninth collotype print in the second installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts, Hodler was obliged to grant access of the painting to the art printers in Vienna for them to create the collotype sometime before 1908. Hodler had been previously invited in 1904 to take part in what would be the last exhibition of the Vienna Secession before Klimt and others associated with Galerie Miethke broke away. In an interview that same year, Hodler indicated that he respected and was impressed by Klimt. Hodler’s esteem for Klimt went beyond the art itself; he emulated Klimt’s method aimed at increasing his market reach and appeal to a wider audience by creating a print portfolio of his painted work. By 1914, Hodler and his publisher had the benefit of hindsight to learn from Klimt’s Das Werk publication.
Responding to the sluggish sales of Klimt’s expensive endeavor, Hodler’s publisher devised the same diversified 1-2-3 strategy for selling Hodler’s Das Werk portfolio as they did with regards to all three works on Hodler they published that year. For their premium tier of DAS WERKS FERDINAND HODLERS, R. Piper & Co. issued an exclusive Museum quality edition of 15 examples on which Hodler signed each page. At a cost of 600 Marks, this was generally on par with Klimt’s asking price of 600 Kronen for his Das Werk portfolio. A middle-tiered Preferred edition of 30, costing somewhat less and with Hodler’s signature only on the Title Page, was also available. The General edition, targeting the largest audience with its much more affordable price of 150 Marks, is distinguishable by its smaller size.
Rather than use the subscription format Miethke had chosen for Klimt’s portfolios which proved to have had its challenges, R. Piper & Co. employed a different strategy. In addition to instantly gratifying the buyer with all 40 of the prints comprising DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS and the choice among three price points, they advertised in German journals a fourth possibility of ordering single prints from them directly. These printed images are easily discernible from the three complete folio editions. The paper size of the single purchased images is of the larger format like the Museum and Preferred editions, measuring 65 h x 50 w cm; however, the paper itself is the same copper print paper used in the General edition and then mounted on poster board. The publishing house positioned itself to be a direct retailer of Hodler’s art. They astutely recognized the potential for profitability and the importance, therefore, of having proprietary control over his graphic works.
R. Piper & Co. owned the exclusive printing rights to Hodler’s best work found in their three publications dating from 1914. That same year, a competing publication out of Weimar entitled Ferdinand Hodler: Ein Deutungsversuch von Hans Muhlestein appeared. Its author, a young scholar, expressed his frustration with the limited availability of printable work by Hodler. In his Author’s Note on page 19, dated Easter, 1914, Muhlestein confirms that the publisher of Hodler’s three works from that same year owned the exclusive reproductive rights to Hodler’s printed original work. He goes further to explain that even after offering to pay to use certain of those images in his book, the publisher refused. Clearly, a lot of jockeying for position in what was perceived as a hot market was occurring in 1914.
Instead, their timing couldn’t have been more ill-fated, and what began with such high hopes suddenly found a much different market amid a hostile climate. The onset of WWI directly impacted sales. Many, including Ferdinand Hodler, publicly protested the September invasion by Germany of France in which the Reims Cathedral, re-built in the 13th century, was shelled, destroying priceless stained glass and statuary and burning off the iron roof and badly damaging its wooden interior. Thomas Gaehtgens, Director of the Getty Research Institute describes how the bombing of Reims Cathedral triggered blindingly powerful and deeply-felt ultra-nationalistic responses: “The event profoundly shocked French intellectuals, who for the most part had an intense admiration for German literature, music and art. By relying on press accounts and abstracting from the visual propagandistic content, they were unable to interpret the siege of Reims without turning away from German culture in disgust. Similarly, the German intelligentsia and bourgeoisie were also shocked to find themselves described as vandals and barbarians. Ninety-three writers, scientists, university professors, and artists signed a protest, directed against the French insults, that defended the actions of the German army.”
In similar fashion, a flurry of open letters published in German newspapers and journals as well as telegrams and postcards sent directly to Hodler following his outcry in support of Reims reflected the collectively critical reaction to Hodler’s position. Loosli documents that among the list of telegrams Hodler received was one from none other than his publisher in Germany, R.Piper & Co. Allegiances were questioned. The market for Hodler in Germany immediately softened. Matters worsened for the publisher beyond the German backlash to Hodler and his loss of appeal in the home market; with the war in full swing until 1918, there was little chance a German publisher would have much interest coming from outside of Germany and Austria. Following the war and Hodler’s death in 1918, the economy in Germany continued to spiral out and just 5 years later, hyper-inflation had rendered its currency worthless vis-a-vis its value in the pre-war years. Like the economy, Hodler’s reputation was slow to find currency in these difficult times. Even many French art fans had turned sour on Hodler as they considered his long-standing relationship in German and Austrian art circles. Thus, the portfolio’s rarity in Hodler’s lifetime and, consequently, the availability of these printed images from DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS since his death has been scarce.
In many ways, Hodler and his portfolios were casualties of war. Thwarted from their intended purpose of reaching a wide audience and show-casing Parallelisme, Hodler’s unique approach to art, this important, undated work has been both elusive and shrouded in mystery. Perhaps DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was left undated as a means of affirming the timelessness of Hodler’s art. Digging back into the past, Hodler’s contemporaries, like R. Piper, C.A. Loosli and Hans Muhlestein, indeed provide the keys to unequivocally clarify what has largely been mired in obscurity. Just after Hodler’s death, the May, 1918 issue of the Burlington Review ran a small column which opined hope for better access to R.Piper & Co.’s DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS; 100 years later, it is finally possible. Hodler’s voice rings out through these printed works. Once more, his modern approach to depicting portraits, landscapes and grand scale scenes of Swiss history speak to us of what is universal. Engaging with any one of these images is the chance to connect to Hodler’s vision and his world view- weltanschauung in German, vision du monde in French- however one expresses these concepts through language, its message embedded in his work is the same: “We differ from one another, but we are like each other even more. What unifies us is greater and more powerful than what divides us.” Today, Hodler’s art couldn’t be more timely.
FERDINAND HODLER (SWISS, 1853-1918) explored Parallelisme through figurative poses evocative of music, dance and ritual. His images of sex, night, desertion and death as well as his many landscapes exploring the universal longing for harmony with Nature are unique and important works embodying a Symbolist paradigm. Truly a Modern Master, Hodler’s influence can be felt in the work of Gustav Klimt and Kolomon Moser and subsequent Expressionist artists such as Egon Schiele. He was born into an impoverished family in Bern, Switzerland in 1853. His entire family succumbed to tuberculosis, and he was orphaned by the age of 13, the only surviving child among his 13 siblings. In the absence of family, the influence and guidance which his art instructors provided Hodler was foundational and profound. Hodler began formal studies in 1872 at the Geneva School of Design. Under Barthelemy Menn, Hodler was drawn to the ordered beauty of Euclidian geometry and Durer’s fundamentals of human proportion that proved to be guiding principles informing his art throughout his life.
By the 1880s, Hodler began to enjoy some recognition for his work which put him on a new path towards stability. Remaining in Geneva, he became assistant to the well-known muralist, Edouard Castres. Following his first solo show in 1885, Hodler’s work took on a Symbolist quality. He frequently associated with a group of Swiss Symbolist...
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper
"Woman Turning Around" Copper Plate Heliogravure
Located in Palm Beach, FL
2018 marks the centenary anniversary of Ferdinand Hodler’s death. In that 100 years time, the art world’s esteem of this important artist has proved fickle. It has shifted from extolling his artistic merits during his lifetime to showing something of a feigned disdain- more reflective of the world political order than a true change of heart for Hodler’s work. After years of Hodler being all but a footnote in the annals of art history and generally ignored, finally, the pendulum has righted itself once again. Recent retrospective exhibitions in Europe and the United States have indicated not only a joyful rediscovery of Hodler’s art but a firm conviction that his work and world view hold particular relevance today. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is not only a collection of printed work reflecting the best of all of his painted work created up to 1914 just before the outbreak of World War I, the portfolio itself is an encapsulation of Hodler’s ethos, Parallelisme.
Hodler developed his philosophy of Parallelisme as a unifying approach to art which strips away detail in search of harmony. By means of abstraction, symmetry and repetition, Hodler sought ways to depict Nature’s essence and her fundamental, universal order. He believed these universal laws governing the natural, observable world extend to the spiritual realm. Symbolist in nature with Romantic undertones, his works are equally portraits of these universal concepts and feelings governing all life as they are a visual portrait in the formal sense. Whether his subject is a solitary tree, a moment in battle, mortal fear, despair, the awe inspired by a vast mountain range, a tender moment or even the collective conviction in a belief, Hodler unveils this guiding principle of Parallelisme.
Several aspects of Hodler’s portfolio reinforce his tenets of Parallelisme. The Table of Contents clearly preferences a harmonious design over detail. The two columns, consisting of twenty lines each, list the images by order of appearance using their German titles. The abbreviated titles are somewhat cryptic in that they obscure the identities of the sitters. Like the image Hodler presents, they are distillations of the sitter without any extraneous details. This shortening was also done in an effort to maintain a harmonious symmetry of the Table of Contents, themselves, and keep titles to a one-line limit. The twenty-fourth title: “Bildnis des Schweizerischen Gesandten C.” was so long, even with abbreviation, that it required two lines; so, for the sake of maintaining symmetry, the fortieth title: “Bauernmadchen” was omitted from the list. This explains why the images are not numbered. Hodler’s reasoning is not purely esoteric. Symmetry and pattern reach beyond mere formal design principles. Finding sameness and imposing it over disorder goes to the root of Hodler’s identity and his art. A Swiss native, Hodler was bi-lingual and spoke German and French. Each printed image, even number forty, have titles in both of Hodler’s languages. Certainly, there was a market for Hodler’s work among francophones and this inclusion may have been a polite gesture to that end; however, this is the only place in the portfolio which includes French. With German titles at the lower left of each image, Hodler’s name at bottom center and corresponding French titles at the lower right of each image, there is a harmony and symmetry woven into all aspects of the portfolio. This holds true for the page design, as it applies to each printed image and as it describes the Swiss artist himself. Seen in this light, Hodler’s portfolio of printed work is the epitome of Hodler’s Parallelisme. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is also one of the most significant documents to best tell the story of how Hodler, from Switzerland, became caught between political cross-hairs and how the changing tides of nations directly impacted the artist during his lifetime as well as the accessibility of his art for generations to come.
The Munich-based publisher of the portfolio, R. Piper & Co., Verlag, plays a crucial role in this story. Publishing on a wide range of subjects from philosophy and world religion to music, literature and the visual arts; the publisher’s breadth of inquiry within any one genre was equal in scope. Their marketing strategy to publish multiple works on Hodler offers great insight as to what a hot commodity Hodler was at that time. R.Piper & Co.’s Almanach, which they published in 1914 in commemoration of their first ten years in business, clearly illustrates the rapid succession- strategically calculated for achieving the deepest and broadest impact - in which they released three works on Hodler to hit the market by the close of 1914. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was their premier publication. It preceded C.A. Loosli’s Die Zeichnungen Ferdinand Hodlers, a print portfolio after 50 drawings by Hodler which was released in Autumn of 1914 at the mid-level price-point of 75-150 Marks; and a third less expensive collection of prints after original works by Hodler, which had not been included in either of the first two portfolios, was released at the end of that year entitled Ferdinand Hodler by Dr. Ewald Bender.
The title and timing of DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS' debut leaves little doubt as to the connection it has with another avant-garde portfolio of art prints, Das Werk Gustav Klimts, released in 5 installments from 1908 -1914 by Galerie Miethke in Vienna. Hodler, himself, was involved in Klimt’s ground-breaking project. As the owner of Klimt’s 1901 painting, “Judith with the Head of Holifernes” which appears as the ninth collotype print in the second installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts, Hodler was obliged to grant access of the painting to the art printers in Vienna for them to create the collotype sometime before 1908. Hodler had been previously invited in 1904 to take part in what would be the last exhibition of the Vienna Secession before Klimt and others associated with Galerie Miethke broke away. In an interview that same year, Hodler indicated that he respected and was impressed by Klimt. Hodler’s esteem for Klimt went beyond the art itself; he emulated Klimt’s method aimed at increasing his market reach and appeal to a wider audience by creating a print portfolio of his painted work. By 1914, Hodler and his publisher had the benefit of hindsight to learn from Klimt’s Das Werk publication.
Responding to the sluggish sales of Klimt’s expensive endeavor, Hodler’s publisher devised the same diversified 1-2-3 strategy for selling Hodler’s Das Werk portfolio as they did with regards to all three works on Hodler they published that year. For their premium tier of DAS WERKS FERDINAND HODLERS, R. Piper & Co. issued an exclusive Museum quality edition of 15 examples on which Hodler signed each page. At a cost of 600 Marks, this was generally on par with Klimt’s asking price of 600 Kronen for his Das Werk portfolio. A middle-tiered Preferred edition of 30, costing somewhat less and with Hodler’s signature only on the Title Page, was also available. The General edition, targeting the largest audience with its much more affordable price of 150 Marks, is distinguishable by its smaller size.
Rather than use the subscription format Miethke had chosen for Klimt’s portfolios which proved to have had its challenges, R. Piper & Co. employed a different strategy. In addition to instantly gratifying the buyer with all 40 of the prints comprising DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS and the choice among three price points, they advertised in German journals a fourth possibility of ordering single prints from them directly. These printed images are easily discernible from the three complete folio editions. The paper size of the single purchased images is of the larger format like the Museum and Preferred editions, measuring 65 h x 50 w cm; however, the paper itself is the same copper print paper used in the General edition and then mounted on poster board. The publishing house positioned itself to be a direct retailer of Hodler’s art. They astutely recognized the potential for profitability and the importance, therefore, of having proprietary control over his graphic works.
R. Piper & Co. owned the exclusive printing rights to Hodler’s best work found in their three publications dating from 1914. That same year, a competing publication out of Weimar entitled Ferdinand Hodler: Ein Deutungsversuch von Hans Muhlestein appeared. Its author, a young scholar, expressed his frustration with the limited availability of printable work by Hodler. In his Author’s Note on page 19, dated Easter, 1914, Muhlestein confirms that the publisher of Hodler’s three works from that same year owned the exclusive reproductive rights to Hodler’s printed original work. He goes further to explain that even after offering to pay to use certain of those images in his book, the publisher refused. Clearly, a lot of jockeying for position in what was perceived as a hot market was occurring in 1914.
Instead, their timing couldn’t have been more ill-fated, and what began with such high hopes suddenly found a much different market amid a hostile climate. The onset of WWI directly impacted sales. Many, including Ferdinand Hodler, publicly protested the September invasion by Germany of France in which the Reims Cathedral, re-built in the 13th century, was shelled, destroying priceless stained glass and statuary and burning off the iron roof and badly damaging its wooden interior. Thomas Gaehtgens, Director of the Getty Research Institute describes how the bombing of Reims Cathedral triggered blindingly powerful and deeply-felt ultra-nationalistic responses: “The event profoundly shocked French intellectuals, who for the most part had an intense admiration for German literature, music and art. By relying on press accounts and abstracting from the visual propagandistic content, they were unable to interpret the siege of Reims without turning away from German culture in disgust. Similarly, the German intelligentsia and bourgeoisie were also shocked to find themselves described as vandals and barbarians. Ninety-three writers, scientists, university professors, and artists signed a protest, directed against the French insults, that defended the actions of the German army.”
In similar fashion, a flurry of open letters published in German newspapers and journals as well as telegrams and postcards sent directly to Hodler following his outcry in support of Reims reflected the collectively critical reaction to Hodler’s position. Loosli documents that among the list of telegrams Hodler received was one from none other than his publisher in Germany, R.Piper & Co. Allegiances were questioned. The market for Hodler in Germany immediately softened. Matters worsened for the publisher beyond the German backlash to Hodler and his loss of appeal in the home market; with the war in full swing until 1918, there was little chance a German publisher would have much interest coming from outside of Germany and Austria. Following the war and Hodler’s death in 1918, the economy in Germany continued to spiral out and just 5 years later, hyper-inflation had rendered its currency worthless vis-a-vis its value in the pre-war years. Like the economy, Hodler’s reputation was slow to find currency in these difficult times. Even many French art fans had turned sour on Hodler as they considered his long-standing relationship in German and Austrian art circles. Thus, the portfolio’s rarity in Hodler’s lifetime and, consequently, the availability of these printed images from DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS since his death has been scarce.
In many ways, Hodler and his portfolios were casualties of war. Thwarted from their intended purpose of reaching a wide audience and show-casing Parallelisme, Hodler’s unique approach to art, this important, undated work has been both elusive and shrouded in mystery. Perhaps DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was left undated as a means of affirming the timelessness of Hodler’s art. Digging back into the past, Hodler’s contemporaries, like R. Piper, C.A. Loosli and Hans Muhlestein, indeed provide the keys to unequivocally clarify what has largely been mired in obscurity. Just after Hodler’s death, the May, 1918 issue of the Burlington Review ran a small column which opined hope for better access to R.Piper & Co.’s DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS; 100 years later, it is finally possible. Hodler’s voice rings out through these printed works. Once more, his modern approach to depicting portraits, landscapes and grand scale scenes of Swiss history speak to us of what is universal. Engaging with any one of these images is the chance to connect to Hodler’s vision and his world view- weltanschauung in German, vision du monde in French- however one expresses these concepts through language, its message embedded in his work is the same: “We differ from one another, but we are like each other even more. What unifies us is greater and more powerful than what divides us.” Today, Hodler’s art couldn’t be more timely.
FERDINAND HODLER (SWISS, 1853-1918) explored Parallelisme through figurative poses evocative of music, dance and ritual. His images of sex, night, desertion and death as well as his many landscapes exploring the universal longing for harmony with Nature are unique and important works embodying a Symbolist paradigm. Truly a Modern Master, Hodler’s influence can be felt in the work of Gustav Klimt and Kolomon Moser and subsequent Expressionist artists such as Egon Schiele. He was born into an impoverished family in Bern, Switzerland in 1853. His entire family succumbed to tuberculosis, and he was orphaned by the age of 13, the only surviving child among his 13 siblings. In the absence of family, the influence and guidance which his art instructors provided Hodler was foundational and profound. Hodler began formal studies in 1872 at the Geneva School of Design. Under Barthelemy Menn, Hodler was drawn to the ordered beauty of Euclidian geometry and Durer’s fundamentals of human proportion that proved to be guiding principles informing his art throughout his life.
By the 1880s, Hodler began to enjoy some recognition for his work which put him on a new path towards stability. Remaining in Geneva, he became assistant to the well-known muralist, Edouard Castres. Following his first solo show in 1885, Hodler’s work took on a Symbolist quality. He frequently associated with a group of Swiss Symbolist...
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
"Night" Copper Plate Heliogravure
Located in Palm Beach, FL
2018 marks the centenary anniversary of Ferdinand Hodler’s death. In that 100 years time, the art world’s esteem of this important artist has proved fickle. It has shifted from extolling his artistic merits during his lifetime to showing something of a feigned disdain- more reflective of the world political order than a true change of heart for Hodler’s work. After years of Hodler being all but a footnote in the annals of art history and generally ignored, finally, the pendulum has righted itself once again. Recent retrospective exhibitions in Europe and the United States have indicated not only a joyful rediscovery of Hodler’s art but a firm conviction that his work and world view hold particular relevance today. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is not only a collection of printed work reflecting the best of all of his painted work created up to 1914 just before the outbreak of World War I, the portfolio itself is an encapsulation of Hodler’s ethos, Parallelisme.
Hodler developed his philosophy of Parallelisme as a unifying approach to art which strips away detail in search of harmony. By means of abstraction, symmetry and repetition, Hodler sought ways to depict Nature’s essence and her fundamental, universal order. He believed these universal laws governing the natural, observable world extend to the spiritual realm. Symbolist in nature with Romantic undertones, his works are equally portraits of these universal concepts and feelings governing all life as they are a visual portrait in the formal sense. Whether his subject is a solitary tree, a moment in battle, mortal fear, despair, the awe inspired by a vast mountain range, a tender moment or even the collective conviction in a belief, Hodler unveils this guiding principle of Parallelisme.
Several aspects of Hodler’s portfolio reinforce his tenets of Parallelisme. The Table of Contents clearly preferences a harmonious design over detail. The two columns, consisting of twenty lines each, list the images by order of appearance using their German titles. The abbreviated titles are somewhat cryptic in that they obscure the identities of the sitters. Like the image Hodler presents, they are distillations of the sitter without any extraneous details. This shortening was also done in an effort to maintain a harmonious symmetry of the Table of Contents, themselves, and keep titles to a one-line limit. The twenty-fourth title: “Bildnis des Schweizerischen Gesandten C.” was so long, even with abbreviation, that it required two lines; so, for the sake of maintaining symmetry, the fortieth title: “Bauernmadchen” was omitted from the list. This explains why the images are not numbered. Hodler’s reasoning is not purely esoteric. Symmetry and pattern reach beyond mere formal design principles. Finding sameness and imposing it over disorder goes to the root of Hodler’s identity and his art. A Swiss native, Hodler was bi-lingual and spoke German and French. Each printed image, even number forty, have titles in both of Hodler’s languages. Certainly, there was a market for Hodler’s work among francophones and this inclusion may have been a polite gesture to that end; however, this is the only place in the portfolio which includes French. With German titles at the lower left of each image, Hodler’s name at bottom center and corresponding French titles at the lower right of each image, there is a harmony and symmetry woven into all aspects of the portfolio. This holds true for the page design, as it applies to each printed image and as it describes the Swiss artist himself. Seen in this light, Hodler’s portfolio of printed work is the epitome of Hodler’s Parallelisme. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is also one of the most significant documents to best tell the story of how Hodler, from Switzerland, became caught between political cross-hairs and how the changing tides of nations directly impacted the artist during his lifetime as well as the accessibility of his art for generations to come.
The Munich-based publisher of the portfolio, R. Piper & Co., Verlag, plays a crucial role in this story. Publishing on a wide range of subjects from philosophy and world religion to music, literature and the visual arts; the publisher’s breadth of inquiry within any one genre was equal in scope. Their marketing strategy to publish multiple works on Hodler offers great insight as to what a hot commodity Hodler was at that time. R.Piper & Co.’s Almanach, which they published in 1914 in commemoration of their first ten years in business, clearly illustrates the rapid succession- strategically calculated for achieving the deepest and broadest impact - in which they released three works on Hodler to hit the market by the close of 1914. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was their premier publication. It preceded C.A. Loosli’s Die Zeichnungen Ferdinand Hodlers, a print portfolio after 50 drawings by Hodler which was released in Autumn of 1914 at the mid-level price-point of 75-150 Marks; and a third less expensive collection of prints after original works by Hodler, which had not been included in either of the first two portfolios, was released at the end of that year entitled Ferdinand Hodler by Dr. Ewald Bender.
The title and timing of DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS' debut leaves little doubt as to the connection it has with another avant-garde portfolio of art prints, Das Werk Gustav Klimts, released in 5 installments from 1908 -1914 by Galerie Miethke in Vienna. Hodler, himself, was involved in Klimt’s ground-breaking project. As the owner of Klimt’s 1901 painting, “Judith with the Head of Holifernes” which appears as the ninth collotype print in the second installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts, Hodler was obliged to grant access of the painting to the art printers in Vienna for them to create the collotype sometime before 1908. Hodler had been previously invited in 1904 to take part in what would be the last exhibition of the Vienna Secession before Klimt and others associated with Galerie Miethke broke away. In an interview that same year, Hodler indicated that he respected and was impressed by Klimt. Hodler’s esteem for Klimt went beyond the art itself; he emulated Klimt’s method aimed at increasing his market reach and appeal to a wider audience by creating a print portfolio of his painted work. By 1914, Hodler and his publisher had the benefit of hindsight to learn from Klimt’s Das Werk publication.
Responding to the sluggish sales of Klimt’s expensive endeavor, Hodler’s publisher devised the same diversified 1-2-3 strategy for selling Hodler’s Das Werk portfolio as they did with regards to all three works on Hodler they published that year. For their premium tier of DAS WERKS FERDINAND HODLERS, R. Piper & Co. issued an exclusive Museum quality edition of 15 examples on which Hodler signed each page. At a cost of 600 Marks, this was generally on par with Klimt’s asking price of 600 Kronen for his Das Werk portfolio. A middle-tiered Preferred edition of 30, costing somewhat less and with Hodler’s signature only on the Title Page, was also available. The General edition, targeting the largest audience with its much more affordable price of 150 Marks, is distinguishable by its smaller size.
Rather than use the subscription format Miethke had chosen for Klimt’s portfolios which proved to have had its challenges, R. Piper & Co. employed a different strategy. In addition to instantly gratifying the buyer with all 40 of the prints comprising DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS and the choice among three price points, they advertised in German journals a fourth possibility of ordering single prints from them directly. These printed images are easily discernible from the three complete folio editions. The paper size of the single purchased images is of the larger format like the Museum and Preferred editions, measuring 65 h x 50 w cm; however, the paper itself is the same copper print paper used in the General edition and then mounted on poster board. The publishing house positioned itself to be a direct retailer of Hodler’s art. They astutely recognized the potential for profitability and the importance, therefore, of having proprietary control over his graphic works.
R. Piper & Co. owned the exclusive printing rights to Hodler’s best work found in their three publications dating from 1914. That same year, a competing publication out of Weimar entitled Ferdinand Hodler: Ein Deutungsversuch von Hans Muhlestein appeared. Its author, a young scholar, expressed his frustration with the limited availability of printable work by Hodler. In his Author’s Note on page 19, dated Easter, 1914, Muhlestein confirms that the publisher of Hodler’s three works from that same year owned the exclusive reproductive rights to Hodler’s printed original work. He goes further to explain that even after offering to pay to use certain of those images in his book, the publisher refused. Clearly, a lot of jockeying for position in what was perceived as a hot market was occurring in 1914.
Instead, their timing couldn’t have been more ill-fated, and what began with such high hopes suddenly found a much different market amid a hostile climate. The onset of WWI directly impacted sales. Many, including Ferdinand Hodler, publicly protested the September invasion by Germany of France in which the Reims Cathedral, re-built in the 13th century, was shelled, destroying priceless stained glass and statuary and burning off the iron roof and badly damaging its wooden interior. Thomas Gaehtgens, Director of the Getty Research Institute describes how the bombing of Reims Cathedral triggered blindingly powerful and deeply-felt ultra-nationalistic responses: “The event profoundly shocked French intellectuals, who for the most part had an intense admiration for German literature, music and art. By relying on press accounts and abstracting from the visual propagandistic content, they were unable to interpret the siege of Reims without turning away from German culture in disgust. Similarly, the German intelligentsia and bourgeoisie were also shocked to find themselves described as vandals and barbarians. Ninety-three writers, scientists, university professors, and artists signed a protest, directed against the French insults, that defended the actions of the German army.”
In similar fashion, a flurry of open letters published in German newspapers and journals as well as telegrams and postcards sent directly to Hodler following his outcry in support of Reims reflected the collectively critical reaction to Hodler’s position. Loosli documents that among the list of telegrams Hodler received was one from none other than his publisher in Germany, R.Piper & Co. Allegiances were questioned. The market for Hodler in Germany immediately softened. Matters worsened for the publisher beyond the German backlash to Hodler and his loss of appeal in the home market; with the war in full swing until 1918, there was little chance a German publisher would have much interest coming from outside of Germany and Austria. Following the war and Hodler’s death in 1918, the economy in Germany continued to spiral out and just 5 years later, hyper-inflation had rendered its currency worthless vis-a-vis its value in the pre-war years. Like the economy, Hodler’s reputation was slow to find currency in these difficult times. Even many French art fans had turned sour on Hodler as they considered his long-standing relationship in German and Austrian art circles. Thus, the portfolio’s rarity in Hodler’s lifetime and, consequently, the availability of these printed images from DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS since his death has been scarce.
In many ways, Hodler and his portfolios were casualties of war. Thwarted from their intended purpose of reaching a wide audience and show-casing Parallelisme, Hodler’s unique approach to art, this important, undated work has been both elusive and shrouded in mystery. Perhaps DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was left undated as a means of affirming the timelessness of Hodler’s art. Digging back into the past, Hodler’s contemporaries, like R. Piper, C.A. Loosli and Hans Muhlestein, indeed provide the keys to unequivocally clarify what has largely been mired in obscurity. Just after Hodler’s death, the May, 1918 issue of the Burlington Review ran a small column which opined hope for better access to R.Piper & Co.’s DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS; 100 years later, it is finally possible. Hodler’s voice rings out through these printed works. Once more, his modern approach to depicting portraits, landscapes and grand scale scenes of Swiss history speak to us of what is universal. Engaging with any one of these images is the chance to connect to Hodler’s vision and his world view- weltanschauung in German, vision du monde in French- however one expresses these concepts through language, its message embedded in his work is the same: “We differ from one another, but we are like each other even more. What unifies us is greater and more powerful than what divides us.” Today, Hodler’s art couldn’t be more timely.
FERDINAND HODLER (SWISS, 1853-1918) explored Parallelisme through figurative poses evocative of music, dance and ritual. His images of sex, night, desertion and death as well as his many landscapes exploring the universal longing for harmony with Nature are unique and important works embodying a Symbolist paradigm. Truly a Modern Master, Hodler’s influence can be felt in the work of Gustav Klimt and Kolomon Moser...
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper
"Young Peasant Girl" Copper Plate Heliogravure
Located in Palm Beach, FL
2018 marks the centenary anniversary of Ferdinand Hodler’s death. In that 100 years time, the art world’s esteem of this important artist has proved fickle. It has shifted from extol...
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper
Reservoir 2006, 8/50, paper, etching, 49.5x29 cm
Located in Riga, LV
Nele Zirnite (1959)
2003 Associate Professor, Art Department, the Latvian Christian Academy
2000 M.F.A., the Latvian Art Academy
1995 – 2003 Lecturer, Graphic Arts Department...
Category
Early 2000s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching
Gustave Riquet (1866-1938) Les Œillets de la vie, 1898 watercolor signed
Located in Paris, FR
Gustave Riquet (1866-1938)
Les Œillets de la vie, 1898 (Carnations of life)
Signed and dated on the lower right,
The text on the lower left is the following "Cueille dès aujourd'hui les oeillets de la vie" , which can be translated as "Pick today the carnations of life"
watercolor on paper
37.5 x 51.5 cm
In good condition
In a modern frame : 53 x 67 cm
The text clearly gives the meaning of this allegorical portrait...
Category
1890s Symbolist Art
Materials
Watercolor
$1,150 Sale Price
20% Off
Prêtresse antique (Ancient Priestess)
Located in Middletown, NY
Heliogravure by Félicien Rops (1833 – 1898), a Belgian artist, known primarily as a printmaker in etching and aquatint. He is noted for his drawings depicting erotic and Satanic them...
Category
Late 19th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Handmade Paper, Photogravure, Stencil
Diffusion 2010, 13/50, A/P
Located in Riga, LV
Nele Zirnite (1959)
2003 Associate Professor, Art Department, the Latvian Christian Academy
2000 M.F.A., the Latvian Art Academy
1995 – 2003 Lecturer, Graphic Arts Department...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching
Dinner 1988, paper, etching, 9x14 cm
Located in Riga, LV
Nele Zirnite (1959)
2003 Associate Professor, Art Department, the Latvian Christian Academy
2000 M.F.A., the Latvian Art Academy
1995 – 2003 Lecturer, Graphic Arts Department...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching
"Portrait of Sculptor James Vibert" Copper Plate Heliogravure
Located in Palm Beach, FL
2018 marks the centenary anniversary of Ferdinand Hodler’s death. In that 100 years time, the art world’s esteem of this important artist has proved fickle. It has shifted from extolling his artistic merits during his lifetime to showing something of a feigned disdain- more reflective of the world political order than a true change of heart for Hodler’s work. After years of Hodler being all but a footnote in the annals of art history and generally ignored, finally, the pendulum has righted itself once again. Recent retrospective exhibitions in Europe and the United States have indicated not only a joyful rediscovery of Hodler’s art but a firm conviction that his work and world view hold particular relevance today. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is not only a collection of printed work reflecting the best of all of his painted work created up to 1914 just before the outbreak of World War I, the portfolio itself is an encapsulation of Hodler’s ethos, Parallelisme.
Hodler developed his philosophy of Parallelisme as a unifying approach to art which strips away detail in search of harmony. By means of abstraction, symmetry and repetition, Hodler sought ways to depict Nature’s essence and her fundamental, universal order. He believed these universal laws governing the natural, observable world extend to the spiritual realm. Symbolist in nature with Romantic undertones, his works are equally portraits of these universal concepts and feelings governing all life as they are a visual portrait in the formal sense. Whether his subject is a solitary tree, a moment in battle, mortal fear, despair, the awe inspired by a vast mountain range, a tender moment or even the collective conviction in a belief, Hodler unveils this guiding principle of Parallelisme.
Several aspects of Hodler’s portfolio reinforce his tenets of Parallelisme. The Table of Contents clearly preferences a harmonious design over detail. The two columns, consisting of twenty lines each, list the images by order of appearance using their German titles. The abbreviated titles are somewhat cryptic in that they obscure the identities of the sitters. Like the image Hodler presents, they are distillations of the sitter without any extraneous details. This shortening was also done in an effort to maintain a harmonious symmetry of the Table of Contents, themselves, and keep titles to a one-line limit. The twenty-fourth title: “Bildnis des Schweizerischen Gesandten C.” was so long, even with abbreviation, that it required two lines; so, for the sake of maintaining symmetry, the fortieth title: “Bauernmadchen” was omitted from the list. This explains why the images are not numbered. Hodler’s reasoning is not purely esoteric. Symmetry and pattern reach beyond mere formal design principles. Finding sameness and imposing it over disorder goes to the root of Hodler’s identity and his art. A Swiss native, Hodler was bi-lingual and spoke German and French. Each printed image, even number forty, have titles in both of Hodler’s languages. Certainly, there was a market for Hodler’s work among francophones and this inclusion may have been a polite gesture to that end; however, this is the only place in the portfolio which includes French. With German titles at the lower left of each image, Hodler’s name at bottom center and corresponding French titles at the lower right of each image, there is a harmony and symmetry woven into all aspects of the portfolio. This holds true for the page design, as it applies to each printed image and as it describes the Swiss artist himself. Seen in this light, Hodler’s portfolio of printed work is the epitome of Hodler’s Parallelisme. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS is also one of the most significant documents to best tell the story of how Hodler, from Switzerland, became caught between political cross-hairs and how the changing tides of nations directly impacted the artist during his lifetime as well as the accessibility of his art for generations to come.
The Munich-based publisher of the portfolio, R. Piper & Co., Verlag, plays a crucial role in this story. Publishing on a wide range of subjects from philosophy and world religion to music, literature and the visual arts; the publisher’s breadth of inquiry within any one genre was equal in scope. Their marketing strategy to publish multiple works on Hodler offers great insight as to what a hot commodity Hodler was at that time. R.Piper & Co.’s Almanach, which they published in 1914 in commemoration of their first ten years in business, clearly illustrates the rapid succession- strategically calculated for achieving the deepest and broadest impact - in which they released three works on Hodler to hit the market by the close of 1914. DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was their premier publication. It preceded C.A. Loosli’s Die Zeichnungen Ferdinand Hodlers, a print portfolio after 50 drawings by Hodler which was released in Autumn of 1914 at the mid-level price-point of 75-150 Marks; and a third less expensive collection of prints after original works by Hodler, which had not been included in either of the first two portfolios, was released at the end of that year entitled Ferdinand Hodler by Dr. Ewald Bender.
The title and timing of DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS' debut leaves little doubt as to the connection it has with another avant-garde portfolio of art prints, Das Werk Gustav Klimts, released in 5 installments from 1908 -1914 by Galerie Miethke in Vienna. Hodler, himself, was involved in Klimt’s ground-breaking project. As the owner of Klimt’s 1901 painting, “Judith with the Head of Holifernes” which appears as the ninth collotype print in the second installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts, Hodler was obliged to grant access of the painting to the art printers in Vienna for them to create the collotype sometime before 1908. Hodler had been previously invited in 1904 to take part in what would be the last exhibition of the Vienna Secession before Klimt and others associated with Galerie Miethke broke away. In an interview that same year, Hodler indicated that he respected and was impressed by Klimt. Hodler’s esteem for Klimt went beyond the art itself; he emulated Klimt’s method aimed at increasing his market reach and appeal to a wider audience by creating a print portfolio of his painted work. By 1914, Hodler and his publisher had the benefit of hindsight to learn from Klimt’s Das Werk publication.
Responding to the sluggish sales of Klimt’s expensive endeavor, Hodler’s publisher devised the same diversified 1-2-3 strategy for selling Hodler’s Das Werk portfolio as they did with regards to all three works on Hodler they published that year. For their premium tier of DAS WERKS FERDINAND HODLERS, R. Piper & Co. issued an exclusive Museum quality edition of 15 examples on which Hodler signed each page. At a cost of 600 Marks, this was generally on par with Klimt’s asking price of 600 Kronen for his Das Werk portfolio. A middle-tiered Preferred edition of 30, costing somewhat less and with Hodler’s signature only on the Title Page, was also available. The General edition, targeting the largest audience with its much more affordable price of 150 Marks, is distinguishable by its smaller size.
Rather than use the subscription format Miethke had chosen for Klimt’s portfolios which proved to have had its challenges, R. Piper & Co. employed a different strategy. In addition to instantly gratifying the buyer with all 40 of the prints comprising DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS and the choice among three price points, they advertised in German journals a fourth possibility of ordering single prints from them directly. These printed images are easily discernible from the three complete folio editions. The paper size of the single purchased images is of the larger format like the Museum and Preferred editions, measuring 65 h x 50 w cm; however, the paper itself is the same copper print paper used in the General edition and then mounted on poster board. The publishing house positioned itself to be a direct retailer of Hodler’s art. They astutely recognized the potential for profitability and the importance, therefore, of having proprietary control over his graphic works.
R. Piper & Co. owned the exclusive printing rights to Hodler’s best work found in their three publications dating from 1914. That same year, a competing publication out of Weimar entitled Ferdinand Hodler: Ein Deutungsversuch von Hans Muhlestein appeared. Its author, a young scholar, expressed his frustration with the limited availability of printable work by Hodler. In his Author’s Note on page 19, dated Easter, 1914, Muhlestein confirms that the publisher of Hodler’s three works from that same year owned the exclusive reproductive rights to Hodler’s printed original work. He goes further to explain that even after offering to pay to use certain of those images in his book, the publisher refused. Clearly, a lot of jockeying for position in what was perceived as a hot market was occurring in 1914.
Instead, their timing couldn’t have been more ill-fated, and what began with such high hopes suddenly found a much different market amid a hostile climate. The onset of WWI directly impacted sales. Many, including Ferdinand Hodler, publicly protested the September invasion by Germany of France in which the Reims Cathedral, re-built in the 13th century, was shelled, destroying priceless stained glass and statuary and burning off the iron roof and badly damaging its wooden interior. Thomas Gaehtgens, Director of the Getty Research Institute describes how the bombing of Reims Cathedral triggered blindingly powerful and deeply-felt ultra-nationalistic responses: “The event profoundly shocked French intellectuals, who for the most part had an intense admiration for German literature, music and art. By relying on press accounts and abstracting from the visual propagandistic content, they were unable to interpret the siege of Reims without turning away from German culture in disgust. Similarly, the German intelligentsia and bourgeoisie were also shocked to find themselves described as vandals and barbarians. Ninety-three writers, scientists, university professors, and artists signed a protest, directed against the French insults, that defended the actions of the German army.”
In similar fashion, a flurry of open letters published in German newspapers and journals as well as telegrams and postcards sent directly to Hodler following his outcry in support of Reims reflected the collectively critical reaction to Hodler’s position. Loosli documents that among the list of telegrams Hodler received was one from none other than his publisher in Germany, R.Piper & Co. Allegiances were questioned. The market for Hodler in Germany immediately softened. Matters worsened for the publisher beyond the German backlash to Hodler and his loss of appeal in the home market; with the war in full swing until 1918, there was little chance a German publisher would have much interest coming from outside of Germany and Austria. Following the war and Hodler’s death in 1918, the economy in Germany continued to spiral out and just 5 years later, hyper-inflation had rendered its currency worthless vis-a-vis its value in the pre-war years. Like the economy, Hodler’s reputation was slow to find currency in these difficult times. Even many French art fans had turned sour on Hodler as they considered his long-standing relationship in German and Austrian art circles. Thus, the portfolio’s rarity in Hodler’s lifetime and, consequently, the availability of these printed images from DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS since his death has been scarce.
In many ways, Hodler and his portfolios were casualties of war. Thwarted from their intended purpose of reaching a wide audience and show-casing Parallelisme, Hodler’s unique approach to art, this important, undated work has been both elusive and shrouded in mystery. Perhaps DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS was left undated as a means of affirming the timelessness of Hodler’s art. Digging back into the past, Hodler’s contemporaries, like R. Piper, C.A. Loosli and Hans Muhlestein, indeed provide the keys to unequivocally clarify what has largely been mired in obscurity. Just after Hodler’s death, the May, 1918 issue of the Burlington Review ran a small column which opined hope for better access to R.Piper & Co.’s DAS WERK FERDINAND HODLERS; 100 years later, it is finally possible. Hodler’s voice rings out through these printed works. Once more, his modern approach to depicting portraits, landscapes and grand scale scenes of Swiss history speak to us of what is universal. Engaging with any one of these images is the chance to connect to Hodler’s vision and his world view- weltanschauung in German, vision du monde in French- however one expresses these concepts through language, its message embedded in his work is the same: “We differ from one another, but we are like each other even more. What unifies us is greater and more powerful than what divides us.” Today, Hodler’s art couldn’t be more timely.
FERDINAND HODLER (SWISS, 1853-1918) explored Parallelisme through figurative poses evocative of music, dance and ritual. His images of sex, night, desertion and death as well as his many landscapes exploring the universal longing for harmony with Nature are unique and important works embodying a Symbolist paradigm. Truly a Modern Master, Hodler’s influence can be felt in the work of Gustav Klimt and Kolomon Moser...
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper
God and the Four Evangelists ("Fool's Concert") - 1943 Linocut on Paper
Located in Soquel, CA
God and the Four Evangelists ("Fool's Concert") - 1943 Linocut on Paper
Leopoldo Méndez (Mexico City, Mexico, 1902–1969) "Fool's Concert" (from the portfolio "25 Prints of Leopoldo ...
Category
1940s Symbolist Art
Materials
Linocut, Printer's Ink, Laid Paper
19th Century Ten Mandala 24 Carat Gold painted Thangka on canvas
Located in TRUMBULL, CT
Ten Mandala 24 carat real gold painted on canvas is a one of a kind Thangka Painting. The thangka is ritual Buddhist Painting use to pray or Meditation purpose. Several steps are inv...
Category
19th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Mixed Media
$24,000 Sale Price
20% Off
Symbolist British Painting Prophet woman Peasants Art nouveau 20th
Located in PARIS, FR
ROBERTSON
20th
Oil on canvas
60 x 73 cm (69 x 82 cm with frame)
Signed and dated lower left "RBTSN / 1909"
Very good condition
Beautiful black frame with black edging
This symbolist...
Category
Early 1900s Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
$1,643 Sale Price
20% Off
André Eugène Costilhes (1865-1940) Portrait of a lady, drawing
Located in Paris, FR
André Eugène Costilhes (1865-1940)
Portrait of a Lady
bears the stamp of the studio of André Eugène Costilhes in the lower right-hand corner
pencil red chalk and heightenings of whi...
Category
Early 1900s Symbolist Art
Materials
Pencil
"The Sphynx is Weary, She Dreams o'er the World" John La Farge, American Artist
By John La Farge
Located in New York, NY
John La Farge
The Sphynx is Weary, She Dreams o'er the World, 1865
Initialed and dated lower right
Gouache, watercolor and black chalk on illustration board
10 1/4 x 12 3/8 inches
P...
Category
1860s Symbolist Art
Materials
Watercolor, Chalk, Gouache, Illustration Board
Ex Libris - Memento Vivere - Woodcut by Michel Fingesten - 1930s
Located in Roma, IT
Ex Libris - Memento Vivere is a colored woodcut print created by Michel Fingesten.
Hand Signed on the lower right margin.
Good conditions.
Michel Fingesten (1884 - 1943) was a ...
Category
1930s Symbolist Art
Materials
Woodcut
$469 Sale Price
20% Off
Seaside from Intermezzi - Etching by Max Klinger - 1881
By Max Klinger
Located in Roma, IT
Seaside from Intermezzi belongs to a series of prints called Intermezzi realized by Max Klinger, published by Nurnberg: Stroefer, 1881.
Etching on paper.
Signed on the plate
Good ...
Category
1880s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
$985 Sale Price
30% Off
Bridges. From the series “My Riga”. 1967. Paper, linocut, 69x103 cm.
Located in Riga, LV
Bridges. From the series “My Riga”. 1967.
Paper, linocut, 69x103 cm.
Category
1960s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Linocut
Pursued Centaur (Verfolgter Centaur) - Etching by Max Klinger - 1881
By Max Klinger
Located in Roma, IT
Pursued Centaur (Verfolgter Centaur) belongs to a series of prints called Intermezzi realized by Max Klinger, published by Nurnberg: Stroefer, 1881.
Etching on paper.
Signed in the...
Category
1880s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
Le Calvaire - Etching and Heliogravure by Félicien Rops - 1882
Located in Roma, IT
Le Calvaire is an original etching, soft ground and colour héliogravure on Japanese paper, realized by Félicien Rops in 1882, signed on plate, plate from Les Sataniques
In very ...
Category
1880s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching, Engraving
VEITH E. Young girl with rose tree. Oil on cardboard. Signed and situated 'Wien'
By Eduard Veith
Located in Paris, FR
Young girl with rose tree. Oil on cardboard. Signed and situated 'Wien'
Eduard Veith, son of the room painter Julius Veith (1820-1887) and his w...
Category
Early 20th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
Huge French 1930's Signed Oil Classical Roman Fountain Statue Floral Scene 1933
Located in Cirencester, Gloucestershire
The Roman Statue
by Gabriel Jules-Charles Girodon (French, 1884–1941) *see notes below
signed and dated
oil painting on canvas, framed
framed: 38 x 47 inches
canvas: 36 x 44 inches...
Category
Early 20th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
ROGANEAU Early 20th century Symbolist painting French Wolves Acropolis Athens
Located in PARIS, FR
François Maurice ROGANEAU
Bordeaux, 1883 - Aix-en-Provence, 1973
Oil on canvas on cardboard
44 x 32 cm (55 x 44 cm with frame)
Signed lower left “FMR”
Mount Lycabettus opposite to t...
Category
Late 19th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
VAN DEN BUSSCHE large decorative painting 20th oil canvas Fantastic landscape
Located in PARIS, FR
Jacques VAN DEN BUSSCHE Marseille, 1925 - 2001 Oil on canvas signed lower right 135 cm x 200 cm Signed lower right Framed Excellent condition
Jacques Van den Bussche is a painter from Marseille. He studied at the School of Fine Arts in Marseille in 1943 and then at the National School of Fine Arts in Paris in 1945. He exhibited in Paris at the Jean-Claude Bellier Gallery with, in particular, Philippe Cara Costea, Jack Chambrin, Georges Feher...
Category
20th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
"The Graces Lie Shy" Intaglio Etching
Located in Soquel, CA
"The Graces Lie Shy" intaglio etching by Chaim Koppelman (American b.1920 d.2009).
Moody etching by prominent American printmaker and educator Chaim Koppelman. In this piece a nude...
Category
1950s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching, Intaglio
Andra Samelson, Jalü #1, archival pigment print, Ed. 4/5, Rainbow reflections
Located in Darien, CT
Rainbow Light can manifest anywhere and anytime, representing ominscience and it can dissolve instantly, representing impermanence. It is without shadow and represents awareness with...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Archival Pigment
Menashe Kadishman, Sheep head 31, Acrylic on canvas
Located in Tel Aviv, IL
Menashe Kadishman, Sheep head, Symbolist painting, colored painting, Israeli art, Israeli art
Category
1980s Symbolist Art
Materials
Acrylic
Suzanne Benton, Renaissance Student, 2017, Monoprint
Located in Darien, CT
“I still look at and learn from the art of the past, and enjoy making interpretations of works which I admire.” Henry Moore
Infanta, Floating Balance, Point in Time, and Visionary are monoprints with Chine collé from Suzanne Benton's Paintings in Proust series. This grouping also includes the dry-point etching with Chine collé. Infanta (edition of 10). The monoprints (unique prints) employ the collage technique, chine collé (glued paper). Collé papers are pre-inked and hand-painted. Dimensional printing plates emboss texture onto the prints. The plates are inked individually for each solo print. The images and collé papers are then laid onto the plate and adhere to the printmaking paper as the plate and paper run through the etching press.
Other monoprint series have been devoted to Indian and Turkish miniature painting...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Monoprint
L'agonie - Etching by Félicien Rops - 1896
Located in Roma, IT
L’agonie is an original colored etching on paper realized by Félicien Rops in 1886, 3rd state of colours proof n°8, from Pellet éditeur, inscribed in p...
Category
1890s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
Illustration from the series "Les Fleurs du mal" - Etching After O. Redon
By Odilon Redon
Located in Roma, IT
Monogram of the artist on plate. Edition of 150 copies. One of the 50 H.C.copies in Roman Numerals. This print is one of the illustrations realized by Odilon Redon for an important e...
Category
1920s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
Menashe Kadishman, Sheep with a crown, Acrylic on canvas
Located in Tel Aviv, IL
Menashe Kadishman, Sheep head, Symbolist painting, colored painting, Israeli art, Israeli art
Category
1980s Symbolist Art
Materials
Acrylic
"Warning" abstract acrylic paint on linen panel 95x62cm 2022
Located in Saint Pol de Léon, Bretagne
"Warning" abstract acrylic paint on linen panel 95x62cm 2022
Looking at the peaceful sky of Brittany came to me the need to paint a possible threat that could fall on us.
Something ...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Marble
$4,507 Sale Price
20% Off
Passage d'une Ame - Etching by O. Redon - 1891
By Odilon Redon
Located in Roma, IT
Passage of a Spirit is an original etching, realized by Odilon Redon in 1891, frontispiece for “La Passante”, edition of 420 copies, titled: " Passage d’une âme ".
Image dimensio...
Category
1890s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
$1,220 Sale Price
20% Off
Garden guardian
Located in Zofingen, AG
This painting will come to you stretched on a wooden stretcher and completely ready to be placed in the interior.
ABOUT THE ARTWORK
"The 'Garden Guardian' serves as the keeper of our...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Canvas, Acrylic
$1,220 Sale Price
20% Off
"Eve and the apple" by Vivaldo Martini - Oil on canvas 65x50 cm
Located in Geneva, CH
His first name sounds like a concerto. Vivacious, its name is reminiscent of an aperitif or a cyclist. The addition of the two evokes the Italianate. Indomitable and unavoidable. Mor...
Category
Mid-20th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
L'Arbre Vert aux Amoureux
By Marc Chagall
Located in OPOLE, PL
Marc Chagall (1887-1985) - L'Arbre Vert aux Amoureux
Lithograph from 1980.
Unsigned and unnumbered apart from the edition of 50.
Dimensions of work: 64.5 x 48 cm.
Reference: Chag...
Category
1930s Symbolist Art
Materials
Lithograph
$4,600 Sale Price
20% Off
Bear and Elf from "Intermezzi" - Etching by Max Klinger - 1881
By Max Klinger
Located in Roma, IT
Bear And Elf from "Intermezzi" is a print realized by Max Klinger in 1881.
Signature and number of the print on plate.
Black and white etching and aquatint. Original title: Bär und...
Category
1880s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
Confubulation of the Transferred Libido, paper/etching, 22 x 24 cm
Located in Riga, LV
Confubulation of the Transferred Libido, paper/etching, 22 x 24 cm
Category
1980s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching
D-156-144, monotype, cardboard/canvas/author's technique, 64x50 cm
Located in Riga, LV
D-156-144, monotype, cardboard/canvas/author's technique, 64x50 cm
Category
1980s Symbolist Art
Materials
Canvas, Paper, Pastel, Acrylic
Illustration from the Series "Les Fleurs du Mal" after Odilon Redon - 1923
By Odilon Redon
Located in Roma, IT
Illustration from the series "Les Fleurs du Mal" is an etching print realized after Odilon Redon and published by Henri Felury in 1923.
Monogrammed on the plate.
Good conditions.
...
Category
1920s Symbolist Art
Materials
Lithograph
Thou shalt also anoint Aaron and his sonnes, and shalt... - The Exodus
By Marc Chagall
Located in OPOLE, PL
This work will be exhibited at Art on Paper NYC, September 4–7, 2025.
–
Marc Chagall (1887-1985) - Thou shalt also anoint Aaron and his sonnes, and shalt consecrate them, that they...
Category
1960s Symbolist Art
Materials
Lithograph
$6,103 Sale Price
20% Off
Profil de Lumiere, Symbolist Collotype after Odilon Redon
By Odilon Redon
Located in Long Island City, NY
Odilon Redon, After, French (1840 - 1916) - Profil de Lumiere, Portfolio: Twenty Four Masterpieces of Graphic Art, Year: Year Printed 1974, Medium: Collotype, Image Size: 14 x 9....
Category
1970s Symbolist Art
Materials
Photogravure
Die Nixen (Mermaids), nudes, German antique engraving
By Virgilio Tojetti
Located in Melbourne, Victoria
'Die Nixen'
(Mermaids)
German wood-engraving, 1903.
230mm by 320mm (image)
280mm by 410mm (sheet)
Category
Early 20th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Engraving
Das Grausen - Lithograph After A. Kubin - 1903
By After Alfred Kubin
Located in Roma, IT
Das Grausen is a lithograph realized after a work by Alfred Kubin in 1903, Hand-signed and titled, plate from Faksimiledrucke nach Kunstblättern, edition H. Von Weber.
Included a...
Category
Early 1900s Symbolist Art
Materials
Lithograph
"La Pacha Mama", Ochre Golden Yellow Beige Symboliste Original Oil Painting
By Andrée Bars
Located in Clermont-Ferrand, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
“La Pacha Mama” is an original oil painting on linen by Andrée Bars.
Bathed in warm ochre, golden yellow, and soft beige tones, set against a starless blue background, this intimate...
Category
2010s Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil
Partout des Prunelles Flamboient - Lithograph by O. Redon - 1888
By Odilon Redon
Located in Roma, IT
Everywhere Eyeballs Are Ablaze is an original lithograph on Chine collé, realized by Odilon Redon in 1888, plate 7 “Les tentations de St.Antoine”(1ère série), unique state, 1st edition printed...
Category
1880s Symbolist Art
Materials
Etching
$3,192 Sale Price
20% Off
Seascape : As Light as a Feather - Original Oil on Canvas, Handsigned
Located in Paris, IDF
Bernard LOUEDIN
Seascape : As Light as a Feather, 1978
Original Oil on Canvas
Handsigned and dated in the lower left corner
On canvas 46 x 61 cm (c. 1...
Category
Late 20th Century Symbolist Art
Materials
Canvas, Oil
Elegant Woman holding White Roses Flowers , Portrait Champetre French Symbolist
Located in Miami, FL
Masterfully painted portrait with rich paint surface by the famous French Symbolist Signed and dated lower left Provenance: Waterhouse & Dodd, London ...
Category
1920s Symbolist Art
Materials
Oil, Wood Panel
$58,000 Sale Price
26% Off
Forellenweiher - Etching and Drypoint by Franz Von Stuck - 1890s
Located in Roma, IT
Forellenweiher is a wonderful black and white etching and drypoint on wide rod cream paper realized by Franz von Stuck in 1890-1891.
Hand signed in gr...
Category
1890s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Drypoint, Etching
Kampf - Vintage Héliogravure by Franz von Bayros - 1921 ca.
Located in Roma, IT
Kampf is a very beautiful black and white héliogravure on cream-colored cardboard realized by Choisy Le Conin, as is remembered Franz Von Bayros (Agram, 1866 – Vienna, 1924).
From M...
Category
1920s Symbolist Art
Materials
Engraving
Mein Weg mit dem Weib #13 - Original Etching by W.R. Rehn
Located in Roma, IT
Drypoint and aquatint (brown ink) on cream paper.
Signed "Rehn" in pencil on the lower right margin. Titled and numbered in pencil on the lower left margin. Edition of 25 prints. Fr...
Category
1910s Symbolist Art
Materials
Drypoint, Aquatint
Green frame. Paper, etching, aquatint, 43x42 cm
Located in Riga, LV
Nele Zirnite (1959)
2003 Associate Professor, Art Department, the Latvian Christian Academy
2000 M.F.A., the Latvian Art Academy
1995 – 2003 Lecturer, Graphic Arts Department...
Category
1990s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching
XXX Paper, etching, 50x52 cm
Located in Riga, LV
Nele Zirnite (1959)
2003 Associate Professor, Art Department, the Latvian Christian Academy
2000 M.F.A., the Latvian Art Academy
1995 – 2003 Lecturer, Graphic Arts Department...
Category
1990s Symbolist Art
Materials
Paper, Etching
Symbolist art for sale on 1stDibs.
Find a wide variety of authentic Symbolist art available for sale on 1stDibs. Works in this style were very popular during the 21st Century and Contemporary, but contemporary artists have continued to produce works inspired by this movement. If you’re looking to add art created in this style to introduce contrast in an otherwise neutral space in your home, the works available on 1stDibs include elements of orange, blue, green, red and other colors. Many Pop art paintings were created by popular artists on 1stDibs, including Michel Fingesten, Abel Pann, Franz von Bayros (Choisi Le Conin), and Ferdinand Hodler & R. Piper & Co.. Frequently made by artists working with Paint, and Oil Paint and other materials, all of these pieces for sale are unique and have attracted attention over the years. Not every interior allows for large Symbolist art, so small editions measuring 1.58 inches across are also available. Prices for art made by famous or emerging artists can differ depending on medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $55 and tops out at $378,675, while the average work sells for $863.
Recently Viewed
View AllMore Ways To Browse
Mauritz Lindstrom
Maximillien Luce
Michael Budden Central Park
Midcentury Matador Paintings
Mike Wright
Miracle On Ice
Mississippi River Painting
Monarch Of The Glen Painting
Moroccan Paintings Essaouira
Morpho Butterfly Art
Mount Tamalpais
Murray Dessner
Native American Oklahoma
New England Barn
New Orleans Jazz Poster
Niagara Falls Oil
Oil Painting By Alice
Oil Painting Willow Tree




