2830 - Georg Kolbe (1877 Waldheim – 1947 Berlin)

Georg Kolbe (1877 Waldheim – 1947 Berlin) Small Crouching Figure (also titled *Crouching Figure*, *Small Seated Figure*, and *Mourner*) Bronze, with a dark brown patina, 1923. Signed “GK” on the reverse of the plinth and marked with the foundry stamp “H. NOACK BERLIN.” Wvz No. 23.010. A magnificent cast with excellent relief definition on the surfaces and a deep, dark, harmonious patina. The edition size—or the exact number of copies of the “Small Crouching Figure”—is unknown. However, the sculpture was apparently cast in only a few pieces and is therefore very rare. The plaster model is housed at the Kolbe Museum in Berlin (Inv. No. Gi471); the Von der Heydt Museum in Wuppertal owns a bronze copy (acquired in 1942; Inv. No. P 0132); since 1995, only a few copies have been offered at art auctions. This is likely one of three posthumous castings authorized by the Kolbe Museum. Kolbe, who achieved his artistic breakthrough in 1912 with his "Dancer," which was later acquired by the National Gallery, achieved his artistic breakthrough; he was admitted as a member of the Prussian Academy of Arts in 1919 and served as president of the Free Secession Berlin from 1919 to 1921. His evolving style was presented in 1921 at a major exhibition at the Cassirer Gallery and in 1922 in a monograph by Wilhelm Reinhold Valentiner. The prominent art critic Karl Scheffler wrote in a 1922 article in the journal “Kunst und Künstler”: “The revolutionary turmoil of the times, which few artists can escape, manifests itself in Kolbe’s art as an acute inclination toward Expressionist stylization (...) There are more recent works in which the artist departs from his usual, readily comprehensible style of modeling in order to deconstruct the forms in a more didactic, Cubist manner (...)”. The female nude figure in “Kleine Hockende” is among the most significant and expressive sculptures from this Expressionist period of 1920–1923, when he was also exploring Cubism. In 1924 (or perhaps as early as 1923 at the Lutz Gallery in Berlin?), Kolbe exhibited the “Little Crouching Woman” at the Academy of Arts’ spring exhibition, and subsequently showed it on several occasions in group and solo exhibitions through 1926. With its stylized contours and sharp edges, “The Little Crouching Figure” displays the Cubist stylistic characteristics that distinguish Kolbe’s sculptures from the early 1920s. The figure’s dynamic composition is permeated by angles that both intersect and repeat in rhythmic parallels. Accordingly, Kolbe also chose a rectangular plinth that is dynamically curved on all sides. Depicted is a seated, deeply introspective young woman with her legs bent, her left leg extended while she simultaneously holds her foot with her left hand. Leaning her upper body forward, she supports her bowed head with one hand in a contemplative—or rather, mournful—gesture. In “The Little Crouching Woman,” Kolbe succeeded in powerfully condensing the reduced form and outline into a unified whole through a complex arrangement of the body and limbs. With this work, Kolbe drew inspiration from the famous crouching “Femme accroupie” sculptures by Auguste Rodin (1880–1882) and Camille Claudel (c. 1884), significantly heightening the expressiveness compared to the bronze sculpture “Sinnende” (cat. no. W 23.009), also created in 1923, which exudes a much greater sense of calm. Five years later, in 1928, Kolbe revisited the pose of the “Kleine Hockende” in a variation—the “Hockende” (cat. no. W 28.002)—which is approximately 10 cm larger and modeled with significantly softer lines. Whereas the “Kleine Hockende” was still entirely inward-focused and, in her absorption, conveyed a deep, intense vulnerability, the later figure exhibits a decidedly strong, self-assured expression of openness, with her head thrown far back and her gaze directed steeply toward the sky. H. 19 cm. See selected literature and exhibitions: Cat. “Second Summer Exhibition (August–September),” Kunsthandlung Galerie Lutz & Co., Berlin 1923, no. 254 (“Crouching Woman”); Cat. “Spring Exhibition,” Academy of Arts in Berlin, Berlin 1924, p. 28, no. 319 (“Crouching Woman”); Cat. “Kolbe.” "Sculpture. 500 Photographs (Sculptures and Drawings. Photographs from the Art History Archive of the Seminar)," Marburg on the Lahn 1931 (2nd ed. 1938), p. 11, Nos. 301–02 (“Small Seated Figure”); Kurt Eugene von Meier: “Georg Kolbe (1877–1947),” Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University, 1966, p. 313, No. 173; Hans Günter Wachtmann (ed.): Cat. “Catalog of Paintings and Sculptures,” Von der Heydt Museum, Wuppertal, 1968, n.p. (“Mourner”); Günter Aust: “The Von der Heydt Museum in Wuppertal,” Recklinghausen 1977, ill. p. 218, no. 439 (“Mourners”); Sabine Fehlemann (ed.): Cat. “Von der Heydt Museum, Wuppertal. Sculpture Collection,” Wuppertal 2000, p. 168 (with ill.). Dark brown patinated bronze, 1923. Signed with monogram