Lot 438 D

Much of the prior work of the Lower-Rhenish artist Hanns Lamers, whose studio was located in B.C. Koekkoek's studio tower Belvedere in Kleve, was entirely destroyed in the war. In 1948 his work resumed with reverse glass paintings: “Hanns Lamers was among the few artists to take up the old technique of reverse glass painting after the Second World War. This is where he placed his focus as an artist between 1950 and his death” (Guido de Werd, in: exhib. cat. Hanns Lamers, op. cit. 1987). In 1958 Kleve's Museum Haus Koekkoek opened with an exhibition in honour of the 60-year-old artist. His studio had become a significant - though local - meeting place. The circle around Lamers at that time included, among others, the young Joseph Beuys, whom he encouraged to work as an artist.
Lamers's reverse glass paintings were preceded by the creation of carefully executed designs, drawings and watercolours, which are still preserved among his estate. Characteristically, the artist also occupied himself with stained-glass-window projects after the war. The present, highly captivating work did not appear in the catalogue raisonné posthumously compiled in 1966, because Hanns Lamers had given it to a former female student of his, who lived and worked in Paris. The abstract figural composition is very balanced. Delicate interior hatching characterises the structural framework, whose chromatic impression and geometry are not lacking in poetry. Influences from the Parisian milieu within which Lamers moved between 1927 and 1934 (Academie Ranson, Roger Bissière and Gino Severini) - and also repeatedly and regularly at a later date - are noticeable in his work after 1945. Lamers was a close friend of Hans Reichel and of the photographer Willy Maywald.