Abstrakte Formen XIV

Details

August Macke (1887-1914)
Abstrakte Formen XIV
stamped on the reverse 'Nachlass AUGUST MACKE'
colored wax crayons on paper
8 1/8 x 5 7/8in. (20.5 x 15cm.)
Drawn in 1913

Provenance

Estate of the artist
Galerie Nierendorf, Berlin
Serge Sabarsky Gallery, New York (acquired by Henry M. Reed)

Literature

U. Heiderich, August Macke: Zeichnungen Werkverzeichnis, Stuttgart, 1993, no. 1952 (illustrated, p. 595)

Exhibited

Berlin, Galerie Nierendorf, Klassiker der jüngen Kunst, 1959, no. 55
New York, Hutton-Hutschnecker Gallery, Inc., Kandinsky, Franz Marc, August Macke, Drawings and Watercolors, April-May, 1969, no. 146
Münster, Westfalisches Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, August Macke, Am Retrospecktive zum 100. Geburtstag, Dec., 1986-Feb., 1987, no. 290 (illustrated in color, p. 387). The exhibition traveled to Bonn, Städtisches Landesmuseum, March-May, 1987, and Munich, Stadtische Galerie Lenbachhaus, May-July, 1987.

Lot Essay

The prismatic composition and the use of pure, non-referential color of Abstrakte Formen XIV is clearly indebted to Delaunay's series of Fenêtres, begun in 1912, as well as earlier Cubist developments in form. In 1912 Macke read art historian Wilhelm Worringer's dissertation Abstraction and Empathy, which had been published in 1908 and appeared to anticipate the course of avant-garde painting in the years that followed. For Macke, the significance of each of these encounters encouraged a brief period of experimentation in pure abstraction. Nevertheless, his great paintings of 1913 and 1914, including those inspired by his visit with Klee to Tunisia in the spring of 1914, always treated subject matter in a comprehensible manner, and indeed, for Macke, his ultimate mastery of formal means is inseparable from his use of subject matter. His understanding of abstraction enriched his visual vocabulary and the impact of Delaunay encouraged Macke to view life from the point of view of an abstract artist.

In a letter dated Münster, June 9, 1987, Ursula Heiderich has confirmed the authenticity of this drawing.