Georg Meistermann
Der Wünschelrutenmann
1944/1945
Oil on canvas 150.3 x 100.3 cm On stretcher. Monogrammed and dated 'GM 45' in yellow lower right margin. - Very fresh colours. Weak craquelure and minimal minor losses of colour in the pastose layers of paint.
Without a doubt, “Wünschelrutenmann” is a self-portrait of the painter in his role as a societal seismograph after the end of World War II. This is suggested not just by contemporary photographs, but also the 1941 painting “Der Maler”, which is very comparable in terms of composition and physiognomy (see exh. cat., travelling exh., Wuppertal/Witten/Solingen/Hamm/Mannheim/Freiburg/Munich 1959/1960, cat. no. 3 with full-page ill.).
Catalogue Raisonné
Herold 83
Provenance
Private collection, North Rhine-Westphalia
Literature
M. de la Motte, Angebotskatalog der Galerie Hennemann Nr. 12, Bonn 1977, ill. n. p.; exhib. cat. Georg Meistermann, Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 1981, ill. no. 21, p. 34
Exhibitions
Koblenz 1947 (Alte Burg), Lebendige Kunst, cat. no. 88; Cologne 1949 (Kölnischer Kunstverein), Georg Meistermann. Ölbilder, Aquarelle und Handzeichnungen, cat. no. 4/Ölbilder; Cologne 1961 (Kölnischer Kunstverein/Kunsthaus Lempertz), Georg Meistermann zum 50. Geburtstag. Gemälde, Aquarelle, Graphik, cat. no. 11, with full-page colour illus. no. II; Bonn/Mannheim 1971 (Rheinisches Landesmuseum/Kunstverein Mannheim), Georg Meistermann, cat. no. 2; Berlin 1975 (Akademie der Künste), Als der Krieg zu Ende war - Kunst in Deutschland 1945-50, cat. no. 1160; Berlin 1985 (Nationalgalerie), Kunst in der BRD, cat. no. 80, ill. p. 88