7139 - Orlowski, Hans

Orlowski, Hans Couple in Front of an Italian Landscape Oil on canvas. 1930. 100 x 120 cm. Signed “ORLOWSKI” in red with a brush on the lower left and dated; signed “ORLOWSKI” again with a brush in black on the reverse, along with the artist’s address. After Hans Orlowski had personally destroyed a large portion of his earlier body of work—which was still influenced by Expressionism—in 1924 as part of his artistic reorientation, he increasingly turned to a more objective, classical approach to painting. The expressive formal language gave way to a calmer style of painting, one more strongly focused on the clear contours and the sculptural effect of the human figure. His engagement with the art of the past was combined with an independent, increasingly ethereal visual language. Orlowski had been teaching at the Berlin-Charlottenburg School of Applied Arts since 1921 and was appointed professor there in 1931. This painting also clearly reflects this development. At the center of the composition stands the monumental female nude, whose elongated, softly modeled body dominates nearly the entire picture plane. Behind her appears a second, clothed figure who is in a peculiarly intimate yet simultaneously tense relationship with her. The unusual gestures—particularly the woman’s raised arm and the male figure’s gentle touch on her face—lend the depiction an enigmatic, almost dreamlike atmosphere. Provenance: Private collection, Austria - Please request condition reports for individual lots, as the condition is usually not mentioned in the catalog. - Please ask for condition reports for individual lots, as the condition is usually not mentioned in the catalog.