Lot 329 D

The bronze “Eva mit der Schlange” offered here derives from the eponymous terracotta sculpture, which Ewald Mataré made in 1936, during his summer stay at Kappeln an der Schlei, in Schleswig-Holstein (Schilling 124). The clay figure “Weiblicher Torso”, which was also created in Kappeln, served as a preliminary study. The “Eva” was damaged in the course of a 1954 exhibition in Stockholm, and its owner commissioned Mataré to produce a bronze version. According to the estate, probably a total of only five bronzes seem to have been cast.
Since the early 1930s Mataré had repeatedly occupied himself with idol-like female images. With his “Weibliches Idol” of 1931/32 (Schilling 75), the “Idol mit Kette” of 1934 (Schilling 92) and a further “Weibliches Idol” of 1934 (Schilling 93), he created figures that recall archaic, Stone Age primal mothers even more strongly than his famous “Weiblicher Torso” of 1932/33 (Schilling 76 and 79).
Mataré took up these forms once again for his “Eva mit der Schlange”, but he carried it out as a full-length figure and added a Christian dimension: covertly looking up, Eve holds an apple out to the viewer with her right hand while a serpent - a Biblical symbol for sin - winds around her feet and legs and observes the offered fruit of temptation from close up.