Komiker--Inv. 4 (Kornfeld 10)

Komiker (Comedian), Der Held mit dem Flügel (Hero with a Wing), and Drohendes Haupt (Menacing Head), (see lots 95-97) belong to a series of ten etched 'Inventions' which Klee created very early in his career when he was just beginning to lay the foundations of his highly personal art. Such examples of Klee's early printmaking are exceedingly rare; Drohendes Haupt--Inv. 10 has never before been offered at auction. He devoted the years between 1903-05 entirely to printmaking, and considered these early etchings to be his first successful artistic achievements. In June 1906 the series was shown at the Munich Sezession exhibition according to Klee's specifications on how they were to be hung. Although his teacher, Franz Stuck, was pleased with Klee's efforts, the critics were baffled. Gagliardi wrote in Berner Rundschau: "It is very difficult to give any sort of clear picture of the crazy anatomy of these forms. Nothing like them appears even in one's wildest dreams and they could only have been produced by someone who deliberately sets out to make a meaningless medly of part-human part-animal fragments."

The series reveals Klee's extraordinary command of anatomical detail combined with a vivid imagination. Many of the 'Inventions' include brief, somewhat explanatory inscriptions added by the artist. On the plate of Der Held mit men Flügel for example, Klee wrote: "Specially provided by nature with only one wing, he took it into his head that he was intended to fly, and that was his undoing." Klee's diary sheds some light on the last etching in the series, Drohendes Haupt: "a sharp negative little demon [bends] over a hopelessly resigned face."