Rudolf Levy
Orchideen
1914
Oil on canvas, the margins relined (old) 64.5 x 54 cm Framed. Signed and dated 'R Levy 1914' in green lower right. With a paper label verso on the canvas, thereon printed in black "SAMMLUNG FLECHTHEIM 166". - Some minute retouches to lower left margin.
The flower still-life on offer once belonged to the collection of the famous art dealer and gallery owner Alfred Flechtheim. During World War I his gallery, founded in 1913 in Düsseldorf, got increasingly into financial difficulties and had to be closed. Thus, Flechtheim auctioned off his gallery portfolio comprising 250 works in 1917. The “Orchideen” on offer was among them. The auction named “Galerie Flechtheim. Moderne Gemälde“ took place on 5 June 1917 in Berlin at Kurfürstendamm 208/209. As Flechtheim was stationed in Belgium as an officer during the war, the auction was conducted by the gallery owner Paul Cassirer from Berlin and Hugo Helbing, an auctioneer from Munich. This auction is regarded as the first to include contemporary art in Germany and was a far-reaching art event with international attention during World War I (cf. www.alfredflechtheim.com/en/trade/auktionen).
Catalogue Raisonné
Thesing 38
Provenance
Formerly Sammlung Alfred Flechtheim, Düsseldorf; formerly Sammlung Hugo Staub, Berlin (from 1923 at the latest); formerly private collection, Rhineland; Private possession, Rhineland
Literature
Dietrich Mende, Rudolf Levy, in: Jahrbuch der jungen Kunst, Leipzig 1923, with illus. n.pag. ("Blumen")
Exhibitions
Galerie Flechtheim, Düsseldorf (1917), Moderne Gemälde, exhibition from 1 until 4 June 1917 in Berlin, auction on 5 June 1917 ibid., no. 166 (see label verso) with illus. ("Vase mit Blumen")