Lot Essay
This work was painted in 1899, at the height of his career, in the same year as the publication of two monographs by Otto Julius Bierbaum and Franz Hermann Meissner.
The sitter is the daughter of the painter, Friedrich August von Kaulbach (1850-1920), of whom he produced a pastel, also entitled Aschenbrödel (private collection), drawn in 1920, (exhibited in Salzweg, Museum Moderner Kunst Passau, Franz von Stuck, 1993/94, illus. no. 9). The pastel is, however, more closely related to a series of paintings entitled Frühling and Mädchenbildnis of 1912 (see H. Voss, op. cit., cat. nos. 388-391), a development of our picture.
The title Aschenbrödel (Cinderella) insinuates innocence, although the image suggests eroticism and strength. This ambivalence expresses the status of a young woman, suggesting her unexplored sexuality and developing personality. This state fascinated Stuck, who first painted this subject in 1889 in one of his earliest paintings, entitled Innocentia (private collection) (H. Voss, Franz von Stuck 1863-1928, Munich, 1973, cat. no. 9 (illus.)) of a girl, clad in thin fabric, holding white lilies.
The sitter is the daughter of the painter, Friedrich August von Kaulbach (1850-1920), of whom he produced a pastel, also entitled Aschenbrödel (private collection), drawn in 1920, (exhibited in Salzweg, Museum Moderner Kunst Passau, Franz von Stuck, 1993/94, illus. no. 9). The pastel is, however, more closely related to a series of paintings entitled Frühling and Mädchenbildnis of 1912 (see H. Voss, op. cit., cat. nos. 388-391), a development of our picture.
The title Aschenbrödel (Cinderella) insinuates innocence, although the image suggests eroticism and strength. This ambivalence expresses the status of a young woman, suggesting her unexplored sexuality and developing personality. This state fascinated Stuck, who first painted this subject in 1889 in one of his earliest paintings, entitled Innocentia (private collection) (H. Voss, Franz von Stuck 1863-1928, Munich, 1973, cat. no. 9 (illus.)) of a girl, clad in thin fabric, holding white lilies.