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Item Ships From: Chicago
The Jockey
By Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
Located in Chicago, IL
Color lithograph on Chine volant, 1899. Edition of aproximately 112. Printed by H. Stern, Paris. Published by Pierrefort, Paris.
Reference: Wittrock; 308-2nd edition, vol. 2, pg. 6...
Category
1890s Art Nouveau Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Our Father Who Art in Heaven" Original 1899 Color Lithograph by Alphonse Mucha
By Alphonse Mucha
Located in Chicago, IL
Alphonse Mucha worked mainly as a poster artist and became an influential figure of Art Nouveau in late 1890s, when poster illustrations were emerging as popular art form and new pri...
Category
1890s Art Nouveau Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Peter Pathe - Original Lithograph Poster
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
PETER PATHE, poster lithograph, Schnackenberg School, 1919, the image features the headline performer, Peter Pathe, in drag wearing a form-fitting button-down jacket, high-waisted shorts buttoning down the front, Mary Jane dance shoes and calf-length white socks; Pathe is depicted in motion with raised jazz hands which frame his bushy-haired heavily made-up face and body curving in dynamic lateral movement with raised front leg turned out; with printed text at the bottom: “PETER PATHE/und/Fritz Wolf-Killanyi * Renate Ferena/Tia Majja * Else Zimmermann tanzenmit grossem/Orchester (Leitung: Rob. Tants) Donnerstag, 18 Nov., amends 71/2 Uhr im Konzertsaal Hotel “Vier Jahreszeiten”/Karten zu Mk. 20. - bis Mk. 3.- bei Alfr. Schmid Nachf., Residenzstr. 7 und Otto Halbreiter, Promendeplatz 16.”; printed text at mid-right: “M. Pathe/19”; marked with the printer’s stamp in the lower right: “Oscar Consee/Kunstanstalt/Munchen/Valley Str./7-9”; the poster is secured by matting and framed with a plexiglass cover, Boston...
Category
1910s Art Nouveau Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Lead Us Not Into Temptation" Original 1899 Color Lithograph by Alphonse Mucha
By Alphonse Mucha
Located in Chicago, IL
Alphonse Mucha worked mainly as a poster artist and became an influential figure of Art Nouveau in late 1890s, when poster illustrations were emerging as popular art form and new pri...
Category
1890s Art Nouveau Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Masturbating Woman Surrounded by Black
By (after) Egon Schiele
Located in Chicago, IL
Published anonymously c. 1920, Vienna, in an edition of 100, after the original gouache, watercolor and pencil on paper, signed and dated in the plate by the artist in middle right: ...
Category
1920s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Portrait of Helene Klimt" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Gerlach's Allegorien, plate #66: "Tragedy" Lithograph, Gustav Klimt.
By Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
Gustav Klimt created this image for inclusion in Gerlach & Schenk’s Allegorien the year before he formed the Vienna Secession. While this design is similar to his other inclusions, L...
Category
1890s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Ballet und Pantomime "Bingha", plate #8.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG BALLET UND PANTOMIME...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Death and Life" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio "Charlotte Pulitzer" collotype
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler Plate #19, Bildnis einer alten Dame; sepia-toned monochrome collotype after the 1917 painting in oil on canvas.
GUSTAV KLIMT EINE NACHLESE (GUSTAV KLIMT AN AFTERMATH), a portfolio of 30 collotypes prints, 15 are multi-color and 15 are monochrome, on chine colle paper laid down on heavy cream-wove paper with deckled edges; Max Eisler, Editor-Publisher; Osterreichischer Staatsdruckerei (Austrian State Printing Office), Printer; in a limited edition of 500 numbered examples of which: 200 were printed in German, 150 were printed in French and 150 were printed in English; Vienna, 1931.
2018 marks the 100th anniversary of Gustav Klimt’s death. It is a fitting time to reflect upon the enduring legacy and deep impact of his art. Recognizing this need for posterity with uncanny foresight, the publication of Gustav Klimt: An Aftermath (Eine Nachlese) provides a rare collection of work after Klimt which has proven to be an indispensable tool for Klimt scholarship as well as a source for pure visual delight.
Approximately 25 percent of the original works featured in the Aftermath portfolio have since been lost. Of those 30, six were destroyed by fire on 8 May 1945. On that fateful final day of WWII, the retreating Feldherrnhalle, a tank division of the German Army, set fire to the Schloss Immendorf which was a 16th century castle in Lower Austria used between 1942-1945 to store objects of art. All three of Klimt’s Faculty Paintings: Philosophy, Medicine and Jurisprudence (1900-1907), originally created for the University of Vienna, were on premises at that time. Also among the inventory of Klimt paintings in storage there was art which had been confiscated by the Nazis. One of the most significant confiscated collections was the Lederer collection which featured many works by Gustav Klimt such as Girlfriends II and Garden Path with Chickens. In many instances, Aftermath is our only link to these lost treasures.
Max Eisler (1881-1937), the publisher of the 1931 Aftermath portfolio, was an art historian at Vienna University specializing in modern and contemporary arts and crafts whose 1920 book on Klimt was the first Klimt monograph. He saw An Aftermath as filling-in important gaps left by the earlier print portfolios which had only featured Klimt up to 1913 and which had glossed over major art projects such as the Tree of Life frieze for the Palais Stoclet. And whereas only 10 of the 50 prints from the earlier portfolios published by H.O. Miethke were made in intricate multi-color images, Eisler augmented the earlier format by featuring half of the 30 images in stunning multi-colored collotypes. Understanding the fragile nature of the collotype printing process also reinforces this project’s distinctive and exceptional characteristics. Fragile collotype plates can not be reused. As such, this necessitates the completion of a run on the first go and also dictates a limited production number. Printed by hand, the collotypes required deft handling by the printer, Osterreichische Staatsdruckerei. A complicated and lengthy process involving gelatin colloids mixed with dichromates, the creation of 16 color separation thin glass filters to achieve the light-sensitive internegative images which could faithfully capture all of the painting’s tonal gradations and colors, exposure to actinic light, and delicate chine collie papers which allowed for greater color saturation, the printer’s collaborative role in capturing and transmitting Klimt’s nuanced paint strokes is nothing short of remarkable.
The Österreichische Staatsdruckerei (Austrian State Printing Office), was the successor to the KK Hof -und Staatsdruckerei which was founded by Emperor Franz I in 1804 and whose collotype printing innovations of Klimt’s art...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Archival Paper
R. Layni, Zeichnungen folio, "Portrait of a Child" Collotype plate X
Located in Chicago, IL
Egon Schiele (1890 – 1918), AUSTRIA
“ART CANNOT BE MODERN, ART IS PRIMORDIALLY ETERNAL.” -SCHIELE
Defiantly iconoclastic in life and art, Egon Schiele is esteemed for his masterful draftsmanship and precocious insight into the human condition. Part of the first wave of Austrian Modernism, he was swept away by the Viennese fascination with the tension between Life and Death (known in the works of Freud and his later interpreters as Eros and Thanatos). Life, identified with attraction, love, sexuality, and reproduction, and Death, represented by distortion, disease, repulsion, and hysteria, often appeared in the same composition, thereby suggesting the frightening life cycle of the human mind and body.
Young throughout his career, Schiele universalized his childhood traumas, thriving libido, insecurities, fears, and longings. His contorted line, jarring contrasts, and flat areas of color, demonstrate an early alliance with Expressionist philosophy and artists who were relentlessly frustrated by conventionality in all its forms. Schiele’s work embodied man’s disorientation and confusion in a seemingly absurd world, a world plagued by disease and war. It continues to be astonishingly relevant today, not just because it helped define Modernism but also because it revealed the dark and immutable aspects of the human condition.
Zeichnungen is a fine art print portfolio published by Verlag der Buchhandlung Richard Lanyi, Vienna, 1917, printed by Max Jaffe...
Category
1910s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
TnT - Surreal Nude Figure, Fine Point Graphite Drawiing, Matted and Framed
By Oliver Hazard Benson
Located in Chicago, IL
An overly exaggerated nude figure is the subject of Oliver Hazard Benson's drawing entitled "TnT". Upon closer look, the artist's fine hand is evident in the amazing detail in the f...
Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Giclée
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "The Virgins" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
The Virgins, no. 2 from the fifth installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts
The Virgins speaks to a new chapter of Klimt’s artistic development. That it was sel...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio "Lady in a Feathered Hat" collotype
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler Plate #2, Dame mit Blumenhut (aka The Violet Hat); sepia monochrome collotype after the 1909 painting in oil on canvas.
...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Harlekin", plate #10.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG BALLET UND PANTOMIME...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
"Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread" Original 1899 Lithograph by Alphonse Mucha
By Alphonse Mucha
Located in Chicago, IL
Alphonse Mucha worked mainly as a poster artist and became an influential figure of Art Nouveau in late 1890s, when poster illustrations were emerging as popular art form and new pri...
Category
1890s Art Nouveau Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
"Salsomaggiore" Original Lithograph poster by Galileo Chini
Located in Chicago, IL
Stone lithograph in custom frame by artist Gail Potocki.
Artist insignia in lower right corner.
Category
1920s Art Nouveau Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
E. Strache, Handzeichnungen folio, "Artist's Sister-in-Law" Collotype plate
By (after) Egon Schiele
Located in Chicago, IL
After Egon Schiele (1890 – 1918), AUSTRIA
“ART CANNOT BE MODERN, ART IS PRIMORDIALLY ETERNAL.” -SCHIELE
Defiantly iconoclastic in life and art, Egon Schiele is esteemed for his mas...
Category
1920s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
This listing is for a single print, pictured, from the Das Werk portfolio by Gustav Klimt and k.k. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei, published by H.O. Miethke. Gu...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
E. Strache, Handzeichnungen, "Seated Female Nude w/Orange Drapery" Collotype
By (after) Egon Schiele
Located in Chicago, IL
“ART CANNOT BE MODERN, ART IS PRIMORDIALLY ETERNAL.” -SCHIELE
Defiantly iconoclastic in life and art, Egon Schiele is esteemed for his masterful draftsmanship and precocious insight...
Category
1920s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio "Baby" collotype
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler Plate #25, Baby; black & white collotype after the 1917 painting in oil on canvas.
GUSTAV KLIMT EINE NACHLESE (GUSTAV KLIMT ...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
The Blue Night - Surreal Giclee Print, Artist Proof, Matted and Framed
By Oliver Hazard Benson
Located in Chicago, IL
Oliver Hazard Benson
The Blue Knight
giclee
35h x 23w in
88.90h x 58.42w cm
1/11 AP
OB0032
Oliver Hazard’s paintings are produced directly from his i...
Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Giclée
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Life is a Struggle" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
Life is a Struggle (The Golden Knight), no. 10 from the second installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts
With his golden armor meticulously and faithfully rendered after examples found ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Archival Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "The Sisters" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under each of the 50 prints is a gold signet intaglio printed on the cream paper each of which Klimt designed for the publication as unique and relating to its corresponding image; H.O. Miethke, Editor-Publisher; k.k. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei, Printer; printed in a limited edition of 300 numbered plus several presentation copies; Vienna, 1908-1914.
The idea of collaboration in the arts is anything but new; however it has so often been viewed and assessed as somehow devaluing the intrinsic worth of art. It’s as if it was a dirty secret to be hidden away. More so even than the eroticism explored by Klimt, which divided public opinion, the artistic avant-garde began to boldly flaunt artistic collaboration beginning in the 19th century- which gained steam in the first part of the 20th century- to become a driving vehicle of contemporary artistic creation. Viewed in this context, the folios of collotype prints published by H.O. Miethke in Vienna between 1908-1914 known as Das Werk Gustav Klimts, are important art documents worthy of as much consideration for their bold stand they take on established ways of thinking about artistic collaboration as they are for their breathtakingly striking images.
1908 is indeed a watershed moment in the history of art. To coincide with the 60th anniversary of the reign of Emperor Franz Joseph I, Kunstschau opened in Vienna in May of that year. It was there that Klimt delivered the inaugural speech. Speaking about the avant-garde group’s unifying philosophy of Gesamtkunstwerk, or the synthesis of the arts, Klimt shared his belief that the ideal means to bring artists and an audience together was via “work on major art projects.” It was at Kunstschau 1908 that Klimt first exhibited his most iconic painting, The Kiss, as well as The Sunflower, Water Snakes I and II and Danae. It was at Kunstschau 1908 that Das Werk Gustav Klimts was first available for purchase. Thanks to Galerie Miethke’s organization, Kunstschau 1908 was possible. Miethke’s pioneering art house had become Klimt’s exclusive art dealer and main promoter of his modernist vision. Paul Bacher and Carl Moll, a founding member with Klimt of the Vienna Secession, who all broke away during the rift in 1905, took stewardship of the gallery following the fallout with the Secession. Das Werk Gustav Klimts is a prime example of Miethke’s masterful and revolutionary approach to marketing art. Miethke’s innovative marketing strategy played to a penchant for exclusivity. The art gallery and publishing house utilized the press and art critics- such as Austria’s preeminent Art Historian, Hugo Haberfield, who became Director of the gallery in 1912- as a means of gaining publicity as well as maintaining effective public relations. Miethke used the grand exposition format to extend the art gallery’s market reach, cultivating their product’s prestige by stroking the egos of current art patrons while simultaneously creating accessibility for newcomers and others avid collectors to share a relative proximity to other wealthy and respected members of the art collecting community. Essentially, their approach paved the way for what is still the predominant means of marketing.
Between 1908 and 1914, H.O. Miethke published a total of 5 installments of print folios of Klimt’s painted work, each comprising 10 prints. The series was limited in availability to 300 and purchase was arranged through subscription. Each issue was presented unbound in a gold embossed black paper folder. Included in the folio was a Title Page, a Justification page and a Table of Contents page itemizing each of the 10 printed works with details about their corresponding painted works as well as information about each work’s current owner. These folios were not comprehensive of Klimt’s work; but rather, they feature what he believed were his most important paintings from 1898-1913. Only 2 collotypes in each folio were multicolored.
To punctuate the fact that Klimt, himself, was very much an active player in creating these printed works, he created square-shaped signets, unique to each collotype which were intaglio printed in gold ink at the bottom of the cream wove papers to which the chine collie papers were affixed.These signets relate thematically to their corresponding printed images and designate each of those images by their placement in the folio’s Table...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Archival Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "The Three Ages of Woman" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Kostume, Plakate, und Dekorationen, "Odeon-Casino"
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG: KOSTUME, PLAKATE UND DEKORATIONEN, a cardboard bound art book consisting of 43 prints of work by Walter Schnackenberg, 30 of which are color lithographs that are signed and some are titled and dated in the plate, as well as black and white prints and photographs with accompanying text by Oskar Bie; lithographs printed at Kunstanstalt Oskar Consee in Munich, other images printed by Gesellschaft Pick & Co. in Munich, the text and cover with color images by Schnackenberg front and verso printed by R. Oldenbourg in Munich; published by Musarion Verlag, Munich, 1920.
The majority of Walter Schnackenberg’s artistic output was destroyed by bomb attacks in Munich in 1944. The highly publicized 2013 auction in New York of the recovered pre-war poster collection once belonging to German poster aficionado, Hans Sachs has reintroduced the world to Walter Schnackenberg’s graphic genius and priceless ephemeral art from a lost era. Besides the museum world, designer Karl Lagerfeld is one of the most prodigious collectors of Schnackenberg. Flipping through the pages of Kostume, Plakate und Dekorationen, it becomes quite clear that Schnackenberg’s collection is ground zero at the crossroads of early modern fashion where the cult of celebrity meets up with dance, music, theater and cabaret, film and the graphic medium. Berlin and Munich under Germany’s Weimar Republic in the first quarter of the 20th century produced just the atmosphere to feed this burgeoning industry. Rising inflation sparked a recklessness to live large for the moment and heightened a desire for escapism. An influx of Indian and East Asian dancers and musicians added to the artsy bohemian cultural mix. A new decadence and tolerance resulted. Film boldly featured provocative subject matter. Cabarets became popular venues giving rise to the demi-monde in which people from all social stations mixed more freely in a thriving underground economy and culture where there was a blurring of boundaries and of social codes. Noted art historian and cultural doyen, Oskar Bie astutely observes in his introduction to Schnackenberg’s publication that what unites the images is fantasy and advertisement. Schnackenberg uses the eye as an instrument to brilliantly construct and convey this double message. His personages never directly confront the viewer. Their eyes gaze off in the distance like those of the screenplayer and film star Hedamaria Scholz in Schnackenberg’s “Die Rodelhexe” movie poster. Their eyes follow the path of a dance composition or become a transfixed and ogling male gaze such as the iconic 1911 Odeon Casino...
Category
1910s Expressionist Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Gerlach's Allegorien, plate #46: "Love" Lithograph, Gustav Klimt.
By Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
Klimt’s association with Martin Gerlach dates back to the early 1880s when Gerlach and Schenk published their first edition of Allegorien und Embleme. By the mid-1890s, they were pla...
Category
1890s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Kostume, Plakate, und Dekorationen, "Odeon-Casino 1911"
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG: KOSTUME, PLAKATE UND DEKORATIONEN, a cardboard bound art book consisting of 43 prints of work by Walter Schnackenberg, 30 of which are color lithographs that are signed and some are titled and dated in the plate, as well as black and white prints and photographs with accompanying text by Oskar Bie; lithographs printed at Kunstanstalt Oskar Consee in Munich, other images printed by Gesellschaft Pick & Co. in Munich, the text and cover with color images by Schnackenberg front and verso printed by R. Oldenbourg in Munich; published by Musarion Verlag, Munich, 1920.
The majority of Walter Schnackenberg’s artistic output was destroyed by bomb attacks in Munich in 1944. The highly publicized 2013 auction in New York of the recovered pre-war poster collection once belonging to German poster aficionado, Hans Sachs has reintroduced the world to Walter Schnackenberg’s graphic genius and priceless ephemeral art from a lost era. Besides the museum world, designer Karl Lagerfeld is one of the most prodigious collectors of Schnackenberg. Flipping through the pages of Kostume, Plakate und Dekorationen, it becomes quite clear that Schnackenberg’s collection is ground zero at the crossroads of early modern fashion where the cult of celebrity meets up with dance, music, theater and cabaret, film and the graphic medium. Berlin and Munich under Germany’s Weimar Republic in the first quarter of the 20th century produced just the atmosphere to feed this burgeoning industry. Rising inflation sparked a recklessness to live large for the moment and heightened a desire for escapism. An influx of Indian and East Asian dancers and musicians added to the artsy bohemian cultural mix. A new decadence and tolerance resulted. Film boldly featured provocative subject matter. Cabarets became popular venues giving rise to the demi-monde in which people from all social stations mixed more freely in a thriving underground economy and culture where there was a blurring of boundaries and of social codes. Noted art historian and cultural doyen, Oskar Bie astutely observes in his introduction to Schnackenberg’s publication that what unites the images is fantasy and advertisement. Schnackenberg uses the eye as an instrument to brilliantly construct and convey this double message. His personages never directly confront the viewer. Their eyes gaze off in the distance like those of the screenplayer and film star Hedamaria Scholz in Schnackenberg’s “Die Rodelhexe” movie poster. Their eyes follow the path of a dance composition or become a transfixed and ogling male gaze such as the iconic 1911 Odeon Casino...
Category
1910s Expressionist Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "The Family" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper w...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
E. Strache, Handzeichnungen folio, "Nursing Mother with Child" Collotype plate
By (after) Egon Schiele
Located in Chicago, IL
after Egon Schiele (1890 – 1918), AUSTRIA
“ART CANNOT BE MODERN, ART IS PRIMORDIALLY ETERNAL.” -SCHIELE
Defiantly iconoclastic in life and art, Egon Schiele is esteemed for his mas...
Category
1920s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio “Allegory of Life and Death” collotype print
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler #18, Der Tod und das Leben; multi-color collotype after original painting (1910-1916) in oil on canvas.
GUSTAV KLIMT EINE NACHLESE (GUSTAV KLIMT AN AF...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio "Portrait of Baroness Wittgenstein" collotype
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler Plate #4, Bildnis Baronin Wittgenstein; dark grey monochrome collotype after the 1905 painting in oil on canvas.
GUSTAV KLIMT EINE NACHLESE (GUSTAV KLIMT AN AFTERMATH), a portfolio of 30 collotypes prints, 15 are multi-color and 15 are monochrome, on chine colle paper laid down on heavy cream-wove paper with deckled edges; Max Eisler, Editor-Publisher; Osterreichischer Staatsdruckerei (Austrian State Printing Office), Printer; in a limited edition of 500 numbered examples of which: 200 were printed in German, 150 were printed in French and 150 were printed in English; Vienna, 1931.
2018 marks the 100th anniversary of Gustav Klimt’s death. It is a fitting time to reflect upon the enduring legacy and deep impact of his art. Recognizing this need for posterity with uncanny foresight, the publication of Gustav Klimt: An Aftermath (Eine Nachlese) provides a rare collection of work after Klimt which has proven to be an indispensable tool for Klimt scholarship as well as a source for pure visual delight.
Approximately 25 percent of the original works featured in the Aftermath portfolio have since been lost. Of those 30, six were destroyed by fire on 8 May 1945. On that fateful final day of WWII, the retreating Feldherrnhalle, a tank division of the German Army, set fire to the Schloss Immendorf which was a 16th century castle in Lower Austria used between 1942-1945 to store objects of art. All three of Klimt’s Faculty Paintings: Philosophy, Medicine and Jurisprudence (1900-1907), originally created for the University of Vienna, were on premises at that time. Also among the inventory of Klimt paintings in storage there was art which had been confiscated by the Nazis. One of the most significant confiscated collections was the Lederer collection which featured many works by Gustav Klimt such as Girlfriends II and Garden Path with Chickens...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Grille" (Cricket), plate #13.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG BALLET UND PANTOMIME...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Black Feather Hat" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Der bose Zauberer" (The Evil Wizard), plate #6.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell o...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "The Hope II" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Scherzo I", plate #4.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG BALLET UND PANTOMIME...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #94: "Heads" Lithograph
By Koloman Moser
Located in Chicago, IL
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...
Category
1890s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Portrait of Marie Henneberg" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Moody Untitled 1920s Boris Anisfeld Lithograph of Figures and City Buildings
Located in Chicago, IL
A ca. 1920s moody, Modernist lithograph by notable artist Boris Israelevich Anisfeld, depicting figures and buildings. Artwork size: 11 3/4" x 9". Archivally matted to 16" x 14".
...
Category
1920s Modern Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph, Paper
Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #35: "Love & Wine" Lithograph
By Koloman Moser
Located in Chicago, IL
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...
Category
1890s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio “Adam & Eve” collotype print
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler #20, Adam und Eva; multi-color collotype after unfinished 1917/18 painting in oil on canvas.
GUSTAV KLIMT EINE NACHLESE (GUSTAV KLIMT AN AFTERMATH), a...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Pallas Athene" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
Pallas Athene, no. 9 from the third installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts
The Klimt-led Vienna Secession which rebelled against the Academic State-run e...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Beethovan Frieze 1 & 2" set of collotype prints
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Orientalische Tänzerin" (Oriental Dancer), plate #18.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell o...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Scherzo II", plate #15.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell o...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Max Eisler Eine Nachlese folio "Wally" (Girl in Profile) collotype
By (after) Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
After Gustav Klimt, Max Eisler Plate #27, Madchen im Profile; grey-toned monochrome collotype after the 1916 painting in oil on canvas. Original destroyed by fire May 1945.
GUSTAV K...
Category
1930s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Kostume, Plakate, und Dekorationen, "Schnackenberg-Ausstellung 1914""
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell o...
Category
1910s Expressionist Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Portrait of Sonja Knips" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Water Snakes I" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
Water Snakes I, no. 9 from the first installment of Das Werk Gustav Klimts
Known by various names, Women Friends, Girlfriends, Water Snakes I and what Kli...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #44: "Music" Lithograph
By Koloman Moser
Located in Chicago, IL
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...
Category
1890s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Vintage Chinese Advertisement Poster, c. 1920
Located in Chicago, IL
This poster from the 1920s melds the meticulous detail of traditional Chinese painting with the craft of color lithography. The poster depicts two young girls gathered by an ornate stool...
Category
Early 20th Century Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper, Ink
E. Strache, Handzeichnungen folio, "Reclining Female Nude Glancing Up" Collotype
By (after) Egon Schiele
Located in Chicago, IL
after Egon Schiele (1890 – 1918), AUSTRIA
“ART CANNOT BE MODERN, ART IS PRIMORDIALLY ETERNAL.” -SCHIELE
Defiantly iconoclastic in life and art, Egon Schiele is esteemed for his mas...
Category
1920s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
R. Layni, Zeichnungen folio, "Torso" Collotype plate IV
Located in Chicago, IL
Egon Schiele (1890 – 1918), AUSTRIA
“ART CANNOT BE MODERN, ART IS PRIMORDIALLY ETERNAL.” -SCHIELE
Defiantly iconoclastic in life and art, Egon Schiele is esteemed for his masterful...
Category
1910s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
H.O. Miethke Das Werk folio "Portrait of Gertha Felsövanyi" collotype print
By Gustav Klimt & K.K. Hof-und Staatsdruckerei
Located in Chicago, IL
DAS WERK GUSTAV KLIMTS, a portfolio of 50 prints, ten of which are multicolor collotypes on chine colle paper laid down on hand-made heavy cream wove paper with deckled edges; under ...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Ballet und Pantomime "Walzer", plate #21.
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG BALLET UND PANTOMIME...
Category
1920s Art Deco Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Paper
Kostume, Plakate, und Dekorationen, "Anne Lemans"
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG: KOSTUME, PLAKATE UND DEKORATIONEN, a cardboard bound art book consisting of 43 prints of work by Walter Schnackenberg, 30 of which are color lithographs that are signed and some are titled and dated in the plate, as well as black and white prints and photographs with accompanying text by Oskar Bie; lithographs printed at Kunstanstalt Oskar Consee in Munich, other images printed by Gesellschaft Pick & Co. in Munich, the text and cover with color images by Schnackenberg front and verso printed by R. Oldenbourg in Munich; published by Musarion Verlag, Munich, 1920.
The majority of Walter Schnackenberg’s artistic output was destroyed by bomb attacks in Munich in 1944. The highly publicized 2013 auction in New York of the recovered pre-war poster collection once belonging to German poster aficionado, Hans Sachs has reintroduced the world to Walter Schnackenberg’s graphic genius and priceless ephemeral art from a lost era. Besides the museum world, designer Karl Lagerfeld is one of the most prodigious collectors of Schnackenberg. Flipping through the pages of Kostume, Plakate und Dekorationen, it becomes quite clear that Schnackenberg’s collection is ground zero at the crossroads of early modern fashion where the cult of celebrity meets up with dance, music, theater and cabaret, film and the graphic medium. Berlin and Munich under Germany’s Weimar Republic in the first quarter of the 20th century produced just the atmosphere to feed this burgeoning industry. Rising inflation sparked a recklessness to live large for the moment and heightened a desire for escapism. An influx of Indian and East Asian dancers and musicians added to the artsy bohemian cultural mix. A new decadence and tolerance resulted. Film boldly featured provocative subject matter. Cabarets became popular venues giving rise to the demi-monde in which people from all social stations mixed more freely in a thriving underground economy and culture where there was a blurring of boundaries and of social codes. Noted art historian and cultural doyen, Oskar Bie astutely observes in his introduction to Schnackenberg’s publication that what unites the images is fantasy and advertisement. Schnackenberg uses the eye as an instrument to brilliantly construct and convey this double message. His personages never directly confront the viewer. Their eyes gaze off in the distance like those of the screenplayer and film star Hedamaria Scholz in Schnackenberg’s “Die Rodelhexe” movie poster. Their eyes follow the path of a dance composition or become a transfixed and ogling male gaze such as the iconic 1911 Odeon Casino...
Category
1910s Expressionist Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph
Kostume, Plakate, und Dekorationen, "Odeon-Casino"
By Walter Schnackenberg
Located in Chicago, IL
Walter Schnackenberg’s style changed several times during his long and successful career. Having studied in Munich, the artist traveled often to Paris where he fell under the spell of the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s colorful and sensuous posters depicting theatrical and decadent subjects. Schnackenberg became a regular contributor of similar compositions to the German magazines Jugend and Simplicissimus before devoting himself to the design of stage scenery and costumes. In the artist’s theatrical work, his mastery of form, ornamentation, and Orientalism became increasingly evident. He excelled at combining fluid Art Nouveau outlines, with spiky Expressionist passages, and the postures and patterns of the mysterious East.
In his later years, Schnackenberg explored the unconscious, using surreal subject matter and paler colors that plainly portrayed dreams and visions, some imbued with political connotations. His drawings, illustrations, folio prints, and posters are highly sought today for their exceedingly imaginative qualities, enchanting subject matter, and arresting use of color.
SCHNACKENBERG: KOSTUME, PLAKATE UND DEKORATIONEN, a cardboard bound art book consisting of 43 prints of work by Walter Schnackenberg, 30 of which are color lithographs that are signed and some are titled and dated in the plate, as well as black and white prints and photographs with accompanying text by Oskar Bie; lithographs printed at Kunstanstalt Oskar Consee in Munich, other images printed by Gesellschaft Pick & Co. in Munich, the text and cover with color images by Schnackenberg front and verso printed by R. Oldenbourg in Munich; published by Musarion Verlag, Munich, 1920.
The majority of Walter Schnackenberg’s artistic output was destroyed by bomb attacks in Munich in 1944. The highly publicized 2013 auction in New York of the recovered pre-war poster collection once belonging to German poster aficionado, Hans Sachs has reintroduced the world to Walter Schnackenberg’s graphic genius and priceless ephemeral art from a lost era. Besides the museum world, designer Karl Lagerfeld is one of the most prodigious collectors of Schnackenberg. Flipping through the pages of Kostume, Plakate und Dekorationen, it becomes quite clear that Schnackenberg’s collection is ground zero at the crossroads of early modern fashion where the cult of celebrity meets up with dance, music, theater and cabaret, film and the graphic medium. Berlin and Munich under Germany’s Weimar Republic in the first quarter of the 20th century produced just the atmosphere to feed this burgeoning industry. Rising inflation sparked a recklessness to live large for the moment and heightened a desire for escapism. An influx of Indian and East Asian dancers and musicians added to the artsy bohemian cultural mix. A new decadence and tolerance resulted. Film boldly featured provocative subject matter. Cabarets became popular venues giving rise to the demi-monde in which people from all social stations mixed more freely in a thriving underground economy and culture where there was a blurring of boundaries and of social codes. Noted art historian and cultural doyen, Oskar Bie astutely observes in his introduction to Schnackenberg’s publication that what unites the images is fantasy and advertisement. Schnackenberg uses the eye as an instrument to brilliantly construct and convey this double message. His personages never directly confront the viewer. Their eyes gaze off in the distance like those of the screenplayer and film star Hedamaria Scholz in Schnackenberg’s “Die Rodelhexe” movie poster. Their eyes follow the path of a dance composition or become a transfixed and ogling male gaze such as the iconic 1911 Odeon Casino...
Category
1910s Expressionist Chicago - Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph