Die Geburtstagsfeier

Between the wars, Berlin established an international reputation as the bawdiest, most licentious city in Europe. Its cabarets were famously explicit, and the brothels well publicised. George Grosz in no small measure contributed, in his vivid depictions of the capital's night life, to the reputation the city gained in this period. The decadence and moral corruption of the Weimar Republic is so convincingly rendered, that it would be no exaggeration to describe George Grosz as the unofficial chronicler of this period. In the mid-1920s, when the present work was executed, Grosz was undergoing a period of transition, moving away from the politically charged days of his involvement with the Communist Party and the Dada group, towards the role of a social commentator and moralist.
Ralph Jentsch, in a letter to Christie's dated August 27, 1998, describes Geburtstagsfeier as "a highly important work", adding that the work is listed in the artist's logbook, on the 11 December 1923, as a work that is to be sent to the new premises of the Malik Verlag. Situated on the Köthener Strasse 38, the publishing house so closely associated with Grosz's political publications (Das Gesicht der Herrschenden Klasse, Proletarier, Die Pleite and Der Blutige Ernst), also opened an art gallery called "Galerie Grosz", where the present work was shown at the inaugural show on the 11 December 1923, together with 21 other watercolours and 6 political drawings.

We are grateful to Ralph Jentsch for his kind assistance in cataloguing this work.