.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Gabriele Münter painted Stilleben mit drei weissen Blumen in 1911, the year she co-founded Der Blau Reiter along with Franz Marc and her former painting teacher turned life-partner, Wassily Kandinsky. The Munich-based group advocated for artistic freedom, bold exploration, and the connection between spirituality and art. They emphasized color’s symbolic and transcendental powers, as publications such as Kandinsky’s Du spirituel dans l'art, written that same pivotal year, would detail.
Although sharing a common vision, each member of the Blue Rider freely developed an individual style—Münter’s own culminated in the expressive and energetic brushwork on display here. In her still lifes especially, the artist strove to capture the essence of fleeting moments, setting this as an imperative far beyond the decorative. She was concerned with immediacy, and acknowledged struggling to reconcile the rapidity of her senses with the slow pace of her brush at the onset of her career:
“At first I experienced great difficulty with my brushwork – I mean with what the French call la touche de pinceau. So Kandinsky taught me how to achieve the effects that I wanted with a palette knife... My main difficulty was I could not paint fast enough. My pictures are all moments of life – I mean instantaneous visual experiences, generally noted very rapidly and spontaneously. When I begin to paint, it's like leaping suddenly into deep waters, and I never know beforehand whether I will be able to swim. Well, it was Kandinsky who taught me the technique of swimming. I mean that he has taught me to work fast enough, and with enough self-assurance, to be able to achieve this kind of rapid and spontaneous recording of moments of life” (G. Münter and R. Heller, Gabriele Münter: The Years of Expressionism 1903–1920, New York, 1997).
Through practice, she had learned to overcome her overly cautious movements and find concordance between her mind’s eye and hand.
In the present work, figurines of animals, trinkets which she collected from local markets, take on a vibrancy akin to those of life, indeed losing their stillness. Through deft strokes and her understanding of color theory, Münter brings her two roosters to life, contrasting their golden yellow to the deep royal blue in the bouquet, smartly bridged over by the vase’s emerald green. The artist also took interest in the Bavarian folk tradition of Hinterglasbilder, or “reverse glass painting,” which used thick black outlines, intense areas of color, and simple forms. Indeed, experimenting in this technique would have encouraged her to give light more fluidity, and to play with its density, even while working on the opaque surface of a board, resulting in the gem-like palette of Stilleben mit drei weissen Blumen. The blend of tradition paired with her and her Blue Rider counterparts’ innovative spirit would denote the language of German Modernity for decades to come.
Although sharing a common vision, each member of the Blue Rider freely developed an individual style—Münter’s own culminated in the expressive and energetic brushwork on display here. In her still lifes especially, the artist strove to capture the essence of fleeting moments, setting this as an imperative far beyond the decorative. She was concerned with immediacy, and acknowledged struggling to reconcile the rapidity of her senses with the slow pace of her brush at the onset of her career:
“At first I experienced great difficulty with my brushwork – I mean with what the French call la touche de pinceau. So Kandinsky taught me how to achieve the effects that I wanted with a palette knife... My main difficulty was I could not paint fast enough. My pictures are all moments of life – I mean instantaneous visual experiences, generally noted very rapidly and spontaneously. When I begin to paint, it's like leaping suddenly into deep waters, and I never know beforehand whether I will be able to swim. Well, it was Kandinsky who taught me the technique of swimming. I mean that he has taught me to work fast enough, and with enough self-assurance, to be able to achieve this kind of rapid and spontaneous recording of moments of life” (G. Münter and R. Heller, Gabriele Münter: The Years of Expressionism 1903–1920, New York, 1997).
Through practice, she had learned to overcome her overly cautious movements and find concordance between her mind’s eye and hand.
In the present work, figurines of animals, trinkets which she collected from local markets, take on a vibrancy akin to those of life, indeed losing their stillness. Through deft strokes and her understanding of color theory, Münter brings her two roosters to life, contrasting their golden yellow to the deep royal blue in the bouquet, smartly bridged over by the vase’s emerald green. The artist also took interest in the Bavarian folk tradition of Hinterglasbilder, or “reverse glass painting,” which used thick black outlines, intense areas of color, and simple forms. Indeed, experimenting in this technique would have encouraged her to give light more fluidity, and to play with its density, even while working on the opaque surface of a board, resulting in the gem-like palette of Stilleben mit drei weissen Blumen. The blend of tradition paired with her and her Blue Rider counterparts’ innovative spirit would denote the language of German Modernity for decades to come.