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Lot Essay
'The little bell, tolled during an execution' is the meaning of the playful title of this work. The work shows various individuals hanging at the gallows on the gallows hill; a town in the background. The bell ring tolled for the souls of the poor sinners after an execution, was a custom in the 19th Century.
At this time, Klee lived in Munich and amongst his circle of friends were not only artists but in particular writers and poets and Reinhard Piper gave him books in exchange for drawings. Klee's source of inspiration might have been related to Christian Morgenstern's poetry The gallow songs of 1905, for which Klee had particular admiration (see W. Grohmann, Paul Klee, 1954, p. 54). Due to his lack of respect for lyrical tradition and his 'nonsense poetry', Morgenstern subsequently became an underdog of German literature with his experimental treatment of language and anarchic pleasure in nonsense, the combination of words, sillabels and sounds that are in no recognisable context, formed an entity of their own. One of the poems is titled 'Galgenberg' (gallows hill) and might have been a direct inspiration for this drawing.
At this time, Klee lived in Munich and amongst his circle of friends were not only artists but in particular writers and poets and Reinhard Piper gave him books in exchange for drawings. Klee's source of inspiration might have been related to Christian Morgenstern's poetry The gallow songs of 1905, for which Klee had particular admiration (see W. Grohmann, Paul Klee, 1954, p. 54). Due to his lack of respect for lyrical tradition and his 'nonsense poetry', Morgenstern subsequently became an underdog of German literature with his experimental treatment of language and anarchic pleasure in nonsense, the combination of words, sillabels and sounds that are in no recognisable context, formed an entity of their own. One of the poems is titled 'Galgenberg' (gallows hill) and might have been a direct inspiration for this drawing.