Lot Essay
The Neun Holzschnitte, representing nocturnal city scenes, were executed in Dresden after the artist's return there from the war in 1919. Made over a period of three years, they embody the artist's changing concerns. In 1919, Dix was one of the founder members of the Dresdner Sezession Gruppe 1919 (Group 19) whose Utopian ideals sprang from the Socialist Revolution of 1918 (promptly suppressed by the right wing Freikorps). Apotheose, dated 1919, derived from the painting Mondweib of the same year, embodies these ideals. Both represent a cosmic vision of Woman as the 'eternal feminine', or life principle. In the woodcut the figure of a woman dominates the composition, her outstretched arms and legs forming the axes of a rotating design made up of buildings and disjointed parts of the male form. As the unifying principle of the composition she is made symbolically the unifying principle of life itself.
The artist's idealism of 1919 quickly gave way to a concern with the harsh and ugly realities of post-war Dresden. His growing obsession with the brothel, which had become an institution during the war, is represented in Liebespaar, dated 1921. As in the painting Erinnerungen an die Spiegelsäle in Brüssel of the year before, a client fondles the pendulous breast of a naked prostitute seated on his knee. It's representation of brute, lewd sexuality is characteristic of Dix's most powerful post war imagery.
The artist's idealism of 1919 quickly gave way to a concern with the harsh and ugly realities of post-war Dresden. His growing obsession with the brothel, which had become an institution during the war, is represented in Liebespaar, dated 1921. As in the painting Erinnerungen an die Spiegelsäle in Brüssel of the year before, a client fondles the pendulous breast of a naked prostitute seated on his knee. It's representation of brute, lewd sexuality is characteristic of Dix's most powerful post war imagery.