505 - Alfred Roller (1864 Brno – Vienna 1935)

Alfred Roller (1864 Brno – Vienna 1935) Secession XIVth Exhibition Poster. Color lithograph on cream-colored vellum. (1902). Consists of 3 sheets, total dimensions approx. 196 x 76 cm (total sheet size approx. 203.5 x 79 cm). Print run unknown. Inscription by another hand at the bottom edge. • Created in 1902 for the Vienna Secession exhibition held in honor of the composer Ludwig van Beethoven • The poster shows a detail from the mural “Die sinkende Nacht” (“The Falling Night”), which was displayed behind the Beethoven monument at the exhibition • Roller was a co-founder of the Vienna Secession in 1897 and served as its president in the year this poster was created In 1902, Alfred Roller designed the poster for the 14th exhibition of the Vienna Secession, held in honor of the composer Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827). Max Klinger’s Beethoven Monument stands in the main hall of the exhibition as a tribute to this artist who, as the catalog states, “brought clarity to our view of art through both his creative work and his words.” Roller, who was president of the association at the time, contributed a large, stenciled painting titled “The Fading Night” as a monumental backdrop to the sculpture; the poster shows a detail from this work. Embedded in a strict ornamental pattern, angelic figures gliding downward with their heads bowed carry the extinguished suns to their graves. Nature and humanity are dissolved into purely ornamental, almost geometric forms, in which the outline of the human figure is merely schematically suggested. The poster picks out a single figure from the procession and combines it with bold, condensed lettering: Here, Roller reveals himself as a master of poster art, skillfully blending ornamental form, lettering, and color into a harmonious, artistic unity. Exhibition: Sécession. L’Art Graphique à Vienne autour de 1900, Musée-Galerie de la Seita, Paris 1999, cat. no. 14, p. 92, with color ill. on p. 61; Neue Galerie, New York 2017/18. Provenance: Serge Sabarsky Collection/Estate, New York; Vally Sabarsky Collection/Foundation, New York. Taxation: subject to regular taxation (VAT: Regular Taxation).