Lot 259 Dα

An abundant bouquet of red carnations - flowers usually picked not in one's own private garden, but in southern greenhouses along the Côte d'Azur or the Italian Costiera dei fiori - are evocatively and decoratively presented before the dark space surrounding them. The impasto staccato of the carnations' red flowers has been realised in wild gestures and stands in charming contrast to the soft impression of the table's rug-like covering featuring what seems to be an oriental pattern. The plunging perspective additionally invests the still life with an optical dynamism that is also reinforced thematically through the letter removed from its envelope. Viewers are inclined to place both - bouquet and letter - in a narrative relationship with one another.
The painting, which Max Slevogt mentions in his personal records for the year 1904, was owned by his mother.
In 1904 Slevogt was working in Berlin on stage sets and costume designs - this may be the source of the interest in textile decoration revealed by our still life. Furthermore, the numerous French impressionists presented at the Secession's exhibitions surely sharpened his eye for contemporary currents in art. “Corinth knew how to interest and amuse and unleash debates. Slevogt, though, dazzled with his spirited talent”, wrote the well-known art critic Karl Scheffler (cited in exhib. cat., Max Slevogt: Die Berliner Jahre, Wuppertal/Berlin 2005, p. 187).