36 - Wilhelm Lehmbruck

Wilhelm Lehmbruck Kleine Sinnende 1910/1911 Cast stone with a reddish-brown tint. Height 54.5 cm. Signed 'W. LEHMBRUCK' in incised letters on the right-hand side of the plinth. Liftetime cast. - In very fine condition. Schubert 55 A 2 The work is accompanied by a number of original documents, including a four-page letter dated 10 February 1919 and two telegrams dated 12 February 1919 from Wilhelm Lehmbruck to Bruno Bloch. These documents attest to the trusting relationship between the artist and his doctor. Provenance Prof. Dr. Bruno Bloch, Zurich (1918); Kornfeld, Bern, Auktion 162, Moderne Kunst, 8/9 June 1977, lot 492; Private collection, Zurich; Galerie Kurt Meissner, Zurich (1979); Erwin Petermann, Stuttgart (1980); Private collection, Baden-Württemberg Exhibitions Cf. i.a. Hagen 1912 (Museum Folkwang), Wilhelm Lehmbruck, Paris. Plastik, Gemälde, Zeichnungen, no cat. no.; Bremen/Berlin/Duisburg/Mannheim 2000/2001 (Gerhard Marcks-Haus/Georg Kolbe-Museum/Wilhelm Lehmbruck-Museum/Städtische Kunsthalle), Wilhelm Lehmbruck, cat. no. 12; Vienna 2016 (Leopold Museum), Wilhelm Lehmbruck. Retrospektive, p. 147, with colour ill.; Stuttgart 2018 (Staatsgalerie), Wilhelm Lehmbruck, cat. no. 9 Literature Dietrich Schubert, Die Kunst Wilhelm Lehmbrucks, Dresden 1990, p. 167-168, plate IV Along with the “Kniende”, the “Kleine Sinnende” is among Wilhelm Lehmbruck’s best-known sculptures. With this piece in cast stone, a decidedly early version, whose first owner also makes it extremely interesting, is coming up for auction. About eight years after it was created, the “Kleine Sinnende” entered the collection of the famous Zurich doctor and professor Bruno Bloch (1878-1933), probably as a gift of the artist. Bloch had been treating Lehmbruck, who suffered from bouts of depression, ever since the artist’s productive stay in Switzerland in 1917/18, which was crowned by exhibitions in Zurich and Basel, and the two of them had established a relationship based on mutual trust. A lengthy letter that Lehmbruck sent from Berlin’s Hotel Excelsior on 10 February 1919 compellingly documents how unwell he was at that time and how much he hoped to be able to travel to Switzerland to see Bloch again: “I’m very unwell here [in Berlin], the inadequate nourishment would be enough all on its own, I’ve already lost a lot of weight and you know that I’m always weak and skinny. There isn’t a drop of milk, which I really miss, I certainly won’t be able to put up with that for long; I’m always appallingly tired, anxious and dizzy, and I have aches in my body and freeze horribly when it’s cold. […] If I may once again ask you, my dear professor, with heartfelt warmth and equal urgency: might you help me with this? I’ll be forever grateful to you. You know me and my organism and what I need for it.” Due to his close connection with the artist and these pleading lines, Bruno Bloch had successfully secured an entry visa for Lehmbruck. In spite of this visa, which was available in time, Lehmbruck took his own life in Berlin on 25 March 1919. The “Kleine Sinnende” was created in Paris within the context of a number of sculptures in which Lehmbruck experimented with new expressive possibilities for movement, emotion and surface qualities. Engaging with the work of Aristide Maillol, he created a slightly twisting but unified female figure with arms crossed and head lowered. Only the leg, slightly projecting forward, breaks through the cohesive silhouette. Even if Lehmbruck preserved the classical proportions of a female figure, he was less interested in a naturalistic representation than a concentration and abstract distillation of the tranquil expressivity so characteristic of his oeuvre.