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Lot Essay
Herwarth Walden, brilliantly characterised by the present sculpture in a fusion of Expressionist angular forms, dissected Cubist planes and dynamic Futurist lines, was one of the most important proponents of the early 20th Century avant-garde in the years 1910 to 1930. As patron, publisher and director of the ground-breaking Galerie Der Sturm in Berlin, he provided young artists, such as Chagall and Kandinsky, with a platform to showcase their new, daring creations. In 1911, he formed a close friendship with sculptor, painter and illustrator, William Wauer, whom he described as having 'created absolute sculpture', having 'resolved the problem of forming reality in an immediately plastic fashion, that is, without imitating nature' (quoted in exh. cat. German Expressionism 1915 - 1925. The Second Generation, Munich, 1990, p. 238). The friendship between the two men led to their collaboration on the book Expressionismus. Die Kunstwende published in 1918, for which Wauer illustrated the cover, designs for which are offered at Christie's London sale of Impressionist and Modern Works on Paper, 25 June 2008, lot 361.
A polymath, Wauer studied in Dresden, Berlin and Liepzig. Initially an art critic for the journal XX Jahrhundert, he also worked as an editor and later as a stage director. Indeed, his friendship with Walden was initiated when he directed Walden's pantomime Die vier Toten der Fiametta in 1911. However, soon he diverted all creative energy into sculpture and exhibited regularly at Galerie Der Sturm from 1918 onwards. He articulated his approach to his creative process as follows: 'Like all artists, I naturally give form to my "ideal man", I wish him to be true to his essence through his physiological substance. I want him, freed of everything human-all-too-human, to be totally charged with the rhythms of the task assigned to his being. The artistic means I employ are the most primitive, most spare, and most direct ones I consider necessary. This is how my form came to be; it concerns itself more with the inner than exterior person' (quoted in op. cit., p. 238).
A polymath, Wauer studied in Dresden, Berlin and Liepzig. Initially an art critic for the journal XX Jahrhundert, he also worked as an editor and later as a stage director. Indeed, his friendship with Walden was initiated when he directed Walden's pantomime Die vier Toten der Fiametta in 1911. However, soon he diverted all creative energy into sculpture and exhibited regularly at Galerie Der Sturm from 1918 onwards. He articulated his approach to his creative process as follows: 'Like all artists, I naturally give form to my "ideal man", I wish him to be true to his essence through his physiological substance. I want him, freed of everything human-all-too-human, to be totally charged with the rhythms of the task assigned to his being. The artistic means I employ are the most primitive, most spare, and most direct ones I consider necessary. This is how my form came to be; it concerns itself more with the inner than exterior person' (quoted in op. cit., p. 238).