ALEXEJ VON JAWLENSKY (1864-1941)

Details
ALEXEJ VON JAWLENSKY (1864-1941)

Variation, Sommer
signed with initials lower left 'A.J.'--signed again, dated, titled and numbered on the reverse 'A. Jawlensky 1915 Varation, Sommer N29'-- oil on canvas laid down by the artist on board
14 x 10¾ in. (35.5 x 27.2 cm.)
Painted Summer, 1915
Provenance
Galerie Jeanne Bucher, Paris (1939-1942)
Curt Valentin Gallery, New York
Acquired from the above by Mr. and Mrs. Ralph F. Colin on June 3, 1955
Literature
C. Weiler, Alexej Jawlensky, Head-Faces-Meditations, New York, 1970, no. 1178 (illustrated)
Exhibited
New York, Curt Valentin Gallery, Der Blaue Reiter, Dec., 1954-Jan. 1955, no. 9
Cambridge, Busch-Reisinger Museum, Artists of the Blaue Reiter, Jan.-Feb., 1955, no. 10
New York, Curt Valentin Gallery, Closing Exhibition Sculpture, Paintings, Drawings, June, 1955, no. 50
New York, M. Knoedler & Co., Inc., The Colin Collection, April-May, 1960, no. 3 (illustrated)

Lot Essay

This painting will be included in the forthcoming supplement of the Jawlensky Catalogue raisonné.

Jawlensky fled to Switzerland at the outbreak of the First World War and abruptly ceased the series of heads which were a blend of German and French Expressionism. Strongly influenced by Delaunay, whose work he owned, the dislocation in his circumstances produced his series of Variations of which this landscape is a prime example:

We had to flee to Switzerland (after the outbreak of
World War I in late summer of 1914) with only that
which we could carry, and we came to St. Prex on Lake
Geneva, a little place near Morges. I had only a
little room with one window to work in at our small
apartment there. I wanted to continue to paint my
powerful, intensely colored pictures, but I felt that
I couldn't. My soul did not permit me this sensual
kind of painting despite the fact there is much that
is beautiful in my work. I felt that I had to find
another language, a more spiritual language. I felt
that in my soul. I sat in front of my window. Before
me I saw a path, a few trees, and from time to time a
mountain in the distance.

Metaphorically speaking, it is thus: I felt within me
within my breast, an organ (as in a church), and I had
to make that organ play. And nature, which was before
me, only prompted me. And that was the key which
unlocked this organ and made it play. At first it was
very difficult. But gradually I was able to find
easily, with color and form, that which was in my soul.
My formats became small: 30 x 40 (centimeters), I
painted very many pictures which I called Variations
on a Landscape Theme
. They are songs without works...
("Alexej Jawlensky and P. Willibrord Verkade", Das
Kunstwerk II
, nos. 1-2, p. 49)