432 - Kurt Schwitters

Kurt Schwitters 1887 Hanover – 1948 Kendal – "Untitled (Portrait of Helma Schwitters)" – (1917) Oil on cardboard. 64.9 x 44.5 cm. 74 x 53.5 cm (Dimensions including frame). Monogrammed and dated lower right: K Sch / 26.3 (cropped). Signed and dated in pencil on the reverse, upper left: painted 1917 / K. Schwitters. Further painting on the reverse. Inscribed there in pencil, lower left: 1000 M /1920 (crossed out), as well as another inscription lower right. Framed. - Provenance: Private collection (Kastern auction, Nov. 29, 2014, lot 15); previously in a private collection in Hanover (purchased in 1965/1969); previously in a private collection, Hanover. - Lit.: Orchard, Karin. Isabel Schulz. Kurt Schwitters. Catalogue raisonné. Volume 1. 1905–1922. Edited by the Sprengel Museum Hannover. Ostfildern-Ruit 2000, no. 197 (with ill.). Created in 1917, this portrait depicts Helma Schwitters, née Fischer, whom the artist had married in 1915. It was created during a period of upheaval: after completing his academic training in Dresden, Schwitters experimented with the expressive means of Expressionism. Shortly thereafter, he turned to abstraction and, beginning in 1919, to Merz art. He depicts his wife in a stern profile, her head tilted far back and her gaze directed upward. Her outstretched hands rest on her chest, a gesture reminiscent of depictions of religious devotion. Bold blue and green outlines frame the face and hands. The blue-violet robe is rendered in broad, directed brushstrokes, while the background seems to swirl around the head in arched layers of paint. Thus, the portrait becomes an image of inner movement. Precisely because Schwitters’ name is today inextricably linked with Merz, such early figurative paintings hold a special appeal. They reveal the painterly tradition from which one of the central artists of the avant-garde emerged. The work is documented in the catalog raisonné and was in a private collection in Hanover—the artist’s birthplace—for decades.