Ariel-Szene aus Faust II

Details

Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944)
Ariel-Szene aus Faust II
oil on board
16 1/8 x 13in. (41 x 33cm.)
Painted in 1908

Provenance

Alexander Strakosch, Switzerland
Galerie Beyeler, Basel
Sylvester Labrot, Hope Sound, Florida
Richard Feigen Gallery, New York (acquired by the present owner, 1964)

Literature

W. Grohmann, Wassily Kandinsky, Life and Work, New York, 1958, p. 345, no. 594 (illustrated, p. 398)
H.K. Roethel and J.K. Benjamin, Kandinsky, Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, New York, 1982, vol. I (1900-1915), no. 188 (illustrated, p. 193)

Exhibited

New York, Kleeman Galleries, Wassily Kandinsky, Jan., 1957, no. 28 (illustrated)

Lot Essay

This painting and a related oil sketch on the verso of a Munich townscape (H.K. Roethel and J.K. Benjamin, op. cit., no. 187) depict the first scene of the first act of Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust Part II. After the death of his beloved Margarete, Faust is seen awakening in a sublime landscape, accompanied by Ariel and other spirits, as a rainbow signifying transcendental promise or hope glimmers overhead.