Two years ago at Grisebach, Max Beckmann's 1943 self-portrait, "Self-Portrait Yellow-Pink", achieved a record price, the highest ever for a work of art sold at auction in Germany, as well as the second-highest auction price for a self-portrait by the German artist. The painting was acquired by the Würth Collection.
Yesterday at the Berlin-based auction house, another masterpiece from 1938 - a rarely exhibited seaside portrait of Beckmann’s wife, Mathilde ‘Quappi’ von Kaulbach, coming from a private collection - sold for 5,398,000 EUR (incl. premium) on an initial estimate of 4 to 6 million EUR.
In 1937, Beckmann and his wife fled Nazi Germany, where Beckmann's art was marked as degenerate. They sought refuge in Amsterdam while waiting for a visa to the United States that didn't come until 1947.
“Quappi mit grünem Sonnenschirm” (Quappi with green parasol), painted one year after the couple found asylum in the Netherlands, represents an emotional memory of love and happiness amid very dark and oppressive times.
Prof. Dr. Eugen Blume, the leading expert on Max Beckmann’s oeuvre, highlights the depiction of Quappi as an allegory of an Indian goddess. The elongated eyes, the symbolic flowers on the woman's legs (a distinctive feature of Indian love deity), and the parasol tracing a sort of halo around her head enhance this connection and elevate the portrait to a different, more spiritual dimension. "The imagination transcends all retinal powers and plumbs deeper realms of the psyche", Blume writes.
Despite the deteriorating living conditions following the outbreak of the war in 1939 and the occupation of the Netherlands in 1940, Beckmann's exile years in Amsterdam became one of his most productive periods. During this time, his painting served to find solace, dignity, and strength.
The artist's diary captured his contrasting feelings during the exile, “Silent death and conflagration all around me, yet I still live."
Max Beckmann (1884-1950)
“Quappi mit grünem Sonnenschirm”. 1938
Oil on canvas. 110 × 65 cm. Signed and dated lower left: Beckmann A. 38. Catalogue raisonné: Tiedemann/Göpel 491 (online catalogue raisonné). [3180] Frame: Spain, second half of the 17th century
Image Courtesy Grisebach/VG Bildkunst, Bonn 2024
Max Beckmann and Quappi on the beach in Viareggio, Italy, 1929
Image Courtesy Grisebach/VG Bildkunst, Bonn 2024
On November 27, at Sotheby's Milan Modern & Contemporary Auction, "Mobili nella Valle", a well-documented painting by Giorgio De Chirico achieved a sale price of 1,920,000 EUR (incl. premium) on an initial estimate of 500,000-700,000 EUR, following a series of continuous rebids.
This transaction marks it as the most expensive work by De Chirico ever sold at auction in Italy.
The painting is part of a series of eight works that Giorgio de Chirico commenced in 1927 during his time in Paris, aimed to deeply explore the essence of common, everyday objects displaced within unconventional and unexpected frameworks.
The concept behind "Mobili nella Valle" comes from two events in the artist's life. The first happened when he was a young boy in Thessaly, Greece. His family spent a night outdoors during an earthquake. The second incident took place later in his life when, as an adult in Paris, the artist was captivated by the sight of soft furnishings displayed on the pavement outside a furniture shop. De Chirico himself then wrote: "An immense and strange happiness emanates from that blessed and mysterious island…Furniture abandoned in the midst of nature is innocence and tenderness in the face of blind and destructive forces."
Renowned for his mastery of the enigmatic, de Chirico’s approach of dislocating familiar items from their ordinary settings was instrumental to the evolution of Surrealism.
Giorgio de Chirico
1888 - 1978
Mobili in una valle
signed
oil on canvas, cm 130x97
Executed in 1927
Image Courtesy Sotheby's
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