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Lot Essay
Woman with Gramophone, Koch's second painting, was done in 1928. A year before he executed his first painting Dolores' Breakfast. He exhibited both paintings in 1928 at the spring exhibition of the Onhafhankelijken. Later he destroyed his Dolores' Breakfast, unsatisfied with the result.
Pyke Koch was a self-taught painter. He had a great admiration for the technique of the Flemish and Italian old masters. In his work Pyke Koch flirts with reality. He almost always creates a tension between the possible and the likely. This is what gives his art the very mystical character that makes him such an important figure in the Dutch 20th century art.
The beginning of his career, around 1928, clearly shows the influence of the German magazine 'Der Querschnitt', which reproduced a lot of work by early surrealists and painters of the Neue Sachlichkeit . His works from that period arouse in atmosphere similarities with the works of painters of the surrealist movement, like René Magritte, Pierre Roy and the Pittura Metafisica of Giorgo de Chirico.
The subject of the painting depicts a woman sitting behind a gramophone in a sober interior that resembles the Dutch interiors of 17th century painters like Pieter de Hoogh. The main and most striking object in the composition is the big brass horn of the gramophone, which seems to combine the sense of sight and hearing in one metaphor. As often in Koch's work the painting looks like a vision from a dream or memories mixed with fantasies. It is a view from a different world that obeys other laws than those that rule our dimension. The spatialness of the composition and the lighting resembles the works of Carlo Carra and De Chirico.
From the start eroticism has been an important element in Koch's work. This does not mean the sexual interpretation is always immediately clear. Often it is disguised and ambiguous. Blotkamp was the first to notice the sexual implication of the gramophone. In the art of contemporary artists, such as George Grosz and Magritte the gramophone became an fetishist object: "The gramophone as a substituted object of lust". (Blotkamp, op.cit. 1972 p.140, note 8) Although Koch asserted he was not aware of the sexual connotation of the gramophone, it is very likely that the ambiguity in the work is of great significance. As Bram Kempers states "Koch loved music and was musical; everything seems perfectly clear, and yet the picture looks clearer than it is: is the figure half hidden by the monumental piece of equipment really a woman; how closely does she resemble the artist, who wore his straight hair - dark - brown in those days - with a parting; what is the meaning of the prominent gramophone and what is implied by the new record on the turntable?
The gramophone is a device adopted by figurative artist who wanted their creations to incorporate elements of the modern age, particularly the 'proud achievements of technique' as Nijhoff called them. Here the figure is placing the stylus on the record: shades of undergraduate humour and an allusion to the varied love-life that was customary in Koch's circles. The gramophone and the invention of the double-sided disc were spectacular innovations with both an auditive and a visual effect. In the artistic circles where these novelties were popular they gave rise to innuendo. 'Gramophone record' was a standard idiom for bisexual and homosexual: 'playable on both sides'." (Bram Kempers, op.cit. p.73)
The painting was purchased directly from the artist's studio by Pyke Koch's lifelong friend Dr. T.J.Botke, who was his first and main supporter. Koch and Botke, both born in 1901, became friends and they entered the University of Utrecht in the early twenties. In 1926 Botke set up as a dentist in Maastricht. In the following years Koch decided to dedicate himself completely to painting and it was Botke who became the main collector of his work. Botke once owned almost every important work by Koch. At the end of his life in 1988 Botke decided to sell the main part of his collection at Christie's Amsterdam B.V.
(Anon. sale, Christie's Amsterdam 8-9 december 1988, lot 239-246)
Pyke Koch was a self-taught painter. He had a great admiration for the technique of the Flemish and Italian old masters. In his work Pyke Koch flirts with reality. He almost always creates a tension between the possible and the likely. This is what gives his art the very mystical character that makes him such an important figure in the Dutch 20th century art.
The beginning of his career, around 1928, clearly shows the influence of the German magazine 'Der Querschnitt', which reproduced a lot of work by early surrealists and painters of the Neue Sachlichkeit . His works from that period arouse in atmosphere similarities with the works of painters of the surrealist movement, like René Magritte, Pierre Roy and the Pittura Metafisica of Giorgo de Chirico.
The subject of the painting depicts a woman sitting behind a gramophone in a sober interior that resembles the Dutch interiors of 17th century painters like Pieter de Hoogh. The main and most striking object in the composition is the big brass horn of the gramophone, which seems to combine the sense of sight and hearing in one metaphor. As often in Koch's work the painting looks like a vision from a dream or memories mixed with fantasies. It is a view from a different world that obeys other laws than those that rule our dimension. The spatialness of the composition and the lighting resembles the works of Carlo Carra and De Chirico.
From the start eroticism has been an important element in Koch's work. This does not mean the sexual interpretation is always immediately clear. Often it is disguised and ambiguous. Blotkamp was the first to notice the sexual implication of the gramophone. In the art of contemporary artists, such as George Grosz and Magritte the gramophone became an fetishist object: "The gramophone as a substituted object of lust". (Blotkamp, op.cit. 1972 p.140, note 8) Although Koch asserted he was not aware of the sexual connotation of the gramophone, it is very likely that the ambiguity in the work is of great significance. As Bram Kempers states "Koch loved music and was musical; everything seems perfectly clear, and yet the picture looks clearer than it is: is the figure half hidden by the monumental piece of equipment really a woman; how closely does she resemble the artist, who wore his straight hair - dark - brown in those days - with a parting; what is the meaning of the prominent gramophone and what is implied by the new record on the turntable?
The gramophone is a device adopted by figurative artist who wanted their creations to incorporate elements of the modern age, particularly the 'proud achievements of technique' as Nijhoff called them. Here the figure is placing the stylus on the record: shades of undergraduate humour and an allusion to the varied love-life that was customary in Koch's circles. The gramophone and the invention of the double-sided disc were spectacular innovations with both an auditive and a visual effect. In the artistic circles where these novelties were popular they gave rise to innuendo. 'Gramophone record' was a standard idiom for bisexual and homosexual: 'playable on both sides'." (Bram Kempers, op.cit. p.73)
The painting was purchased directly from the artist's studio by Pyke Koch's lifelong friend Dr. T.J.Botke, who was his first and main supporter. Koch and Botke, both born in 1901, became friends and they entered the University of Utrecht in the early twenties. In 1926 Botke set up as a dentist in Maastricht. In the following years Koch decided to dedicate himself completely to painting and it was Botke who became the main collector of his work. Botke once owned almost every important work by Koch. At the end of his life in 1988 Botke decided to sell the main part of his collection at Christie's Amsterdam B.V.
(Anon. sale, Christie's Amsterdam 8-9 december 1988, lot 239-246)