Oil on canvas. Signed and dated lower right. Signed and dated on the reverse, signed, dated and titled on the stretcher. 81 x 71 cm. . [CH].
- A comprehensive and international exhibition history dating back to 1926. - Over the years, the work has been on permanent loan to major German museums, including the Brücke Museum in Berlin and the Moritzburg Kunstmuseum in Halle (Saale). - Intimate depiction of the artist's partner, Milda Frieda Georgi (1891-1982), who performed as a dancer under the stage name "Siddi Riha" and whom Heckel had married a few years earlier during the war. - Heckel's work from the mid-1920s onward takes up individual stylistic principles of New Objectivity. - In his Berlin studio/apartment at Emserstrasse 2, the artist created various wall paintings as of 1919, including this frieze with ornamental abstract plants and figures on a light background and a red stripe at the top. - The frieze can also be seen in the paintings "Amaryllis" (Hüneke 1927-23) and "Schlafende" (Hüneke 1932-2) as well as in several watercolors like "Stillleben mit Rosen in schwarzem Krug" (1926, Kunsthalle Karlsruhe).
The work is registered in the Erich Heckel Estate, Hemmenhofen on Lake Constance. We are grateful to Mrs Renate Ebner for the kind support in cataloging this lot.
LITERATURE: Paul Vogt, Erich Heckel, Recklinghausen 1965, cat. no. 1925-1 (black-and-white illu.). Andreas Hüneke, Erich Heckel. Werkverzeichnis der Gemälde, Wandbilder und Skulpturen, vol. II (1919-1964), Munich 2017, pp. 119 and 421, no. 1925-1 (color illu.) - - Ludwig Thormaehlen, Erich Heckel, Berlin 1931 (full-page illu., Tafel 22). Erhard Göpel, Erich Heckel-Ausstellung in Chemnitz, in: Kunst und Künstler: illustrierte Monatsschrift für bildende Kunst und Kunstgewerbe 29.1931, issue 9, p. 359. Brücke-Museum (ed.), Katalog der Gemälde, Glasfenster und Skulpturen, Berlin 1983, cat. no. 27 (full-page illu.). Hermann Gerlinger, Katja Schneider (eds.), Die Maler der Brücke. Inventory catalog Hermann Gerlinger Collection, Halle (Saale) 2005, p. 228, SHG no. 518 (illu.). Katja Schneider, Moderne und Gegenwart. Das Kunstmuseum in Halle, Munich 2008, cat. no. 126. Markus Lörz, Neuere Deutsche Kunst: Oslo, Kopenhagen, Köln 1932. Rekonstruktion und Dokumentation, Stuttgart 2008, p. 131 and hist. illu. no. XII, XIV.
Heckel's studio apartment in Berlin-Wilmersdorf " Essentially, it is the classic pictorial genres, namely portrait, still life and landscape, to which Heckel dedicated his entire artistic endeavors throughout his life and from which he meticulously wrested ever new variations of expression," writes art historian and former (until 2017) director of the Brücke-Museum Magdalena M. Moeller (Zu Heckels Werk der 20er Jahre, in: exhib. cat. Erich Heckel. Sein Werk der 20er Jahre, Brücke-Museum, Berlin, Munich 2004, p. 10). With the " Frauenbildnis" (Portrait of a Woman), Heckel created an intimate depiction of his wife Siddi, whose real name was Milda Frieda Georgi (1891-1982). The artist had met the dancer who went by the stage name "Siddi Riha" in Dresden in 1910 and married her during the war. Siddi remained one of his most important models throughout his life. After the end of the war in December 1919, Siddi and Erich Heckel rented a studio apartment on the top floor of a house in Emser Strasse in Berlin-Wilmersdorf, which would become their permanent residence until it was destroyed in 1943. In the same year, the couple purchased a small house in Osterholz on the Flensburg Firth, where the artist set up a second studio. Heckel painted figurative and ornamental elements on several walls in both the Berlin studio apartment and in Osterholz. The "Frauenbildnis" was created in Berlin, however, no reports from visitors or even photographs of the wall paintings have survived. Only Heckel's original sketches and a few watercolors and paintings document these works of art, which were destroyed in World War II. In the back of this painting, we can see the painted pedestal bordered by a broad red stripe: Heckel sketched several figures and abstract ornamental plants on a light background. While a hugging couple can be identified in our "Frauenbildnis" - possibly a reference to the artist's connection to his wife - "Amaryllis" (1927, part of the Hermann Gerlinger Collection until 2023) and "Schlafende Frau" (1932, Kunsthalle Mannheim) show, among other things, a reclining man with a beard. A watercolor in the Kunsthalle Karlsruhe also shows a standing nude from behind ("Stillleben mit Rosen und schwarzem Krug", 1926).
Emotionality and contemplation Despite his newfound closeness to nature, Heckel was far from a factual, objective depiction of reality. Instead, he deliberately created compositions in which he changed nature, reduced it and shaped it according to his artistic principles. The "Frauenbildnis" shows a serene and affectionate Siddi in a subdued pictorial language and melancholic mood. Heckel placed Siddi in the foreground of the painting and composed her surroundings from deep spatial zones and color fields. Despite the clearly restrained, clear and orderly pictorial language, the simplified forms and warm, calm colors, Heckel created a powerful and expressive portrait that also describes his entire personal world: his wife, his studio apartment, his art in the background and thus his profession. Heckel contrasts stylistic elements of New Objectivity with a quiet inwardness and emotionality that clearly distinguishes his portraits from the works of "New Objectivity", giving them a very unique, exciting and ambivalent artistic position within the rich artistic landscape of the years between the wars. [CH]