Lot 218 D

Johanna Schütz-Wolff's abilities as an artist and artisan were already being fostered very early on, in her childhood home. Her father was an architect who had moved from Hesse to Halle to be part of a joint architectural office, but he soon opened his own studio for architecture and applied art. As a member of the Werkbund, he was emphatically open to innovations in the field of applied art, and he created numerous significant buildings. Johanna's elder sister studied under Henry van de Velde at the school of applied art in Weimar; after also spending a brief period there, Johanna moved back to Halle and experienced the surge of modernism at the Burg Giebichenstein school of crafts and applied arts under the Munich architect Paul Thiersch. The Franz Marc exhibition she saw with Thiersch at Berlin's “Sturm” gallery in 1916 greatly impressed Johanna Schütz-Wolff. Her interest in Expressionism had been kindled. After spending time as a “master pupil” under Fritz Ehmcke at the school of applied art in Munich, which was directed by Riemerschmid, and her opportunity to work for Peter Behrens in Berlin, Thiersch offered her a position as head of the newly established textile class at Burg Giebichenstein in 1920. She accepted this offer, but not without first meeting with Maria Marc and revelling in the works left behind among Franz Marc's estate during a stay of several months. They developed plans to convert Marc's ideas into enamel and textile works. With regard to colouristic and stylistic criteria, the art of Franz Marc may also have led to a series of works in tempera - including the work offered here - which she created in 1920 and which are compelling on account of their forceful wildness and vigorous abundance of colours.