Bronze sculpture. Height 87.5 cm. Signed and dated E. Barlach / 1931 on left side of base as well as with the foundry mark "H. NOACK BERLIN" on the reverse side bottom left. After the plaster model made in 1931 (Laur 473), a bronze was cast in 1938; since 1950 14 unnumbered cast sculptures. The work offered here belongs to one of the posthumous casts. - With light, reddish to bronze coloured shimmering patina.
There exists a preparatory drawing for the figure made in 1922 (Schult Zeichnungen 1642). - In his lifetime, Barlach was not able to install his bronze in a sacred context, as Schult describes. However, the "Lehrender Christus" was used for Christian Rohlfs' Hagen tomb in 1938. Further bronze casts are in the Stedelijk van Abbe-Museum, Eindhoven and in the Israel Museum, Jerusalem.
Laur 474; Schult 373
Provenance
Formerly North German private possession (commissioned cast)
Literature
Ernst Barlach, Die Briefe II, 1925 - 1938, (ed. Friedrich Droß), Munich 1969, p. 868, p. 870; Carl Dietrich Carls, Ernst Barlach. Das plastische, graphische und dichterische Werk, Flensburg/Hamburg 1950 (5th edition), p. 77; Ernst Barlach, Ein selbsterzähltes Leben, Munich 1995, ill. 8 (plaster toned); Elmar Jansen (ed.), Die Ernst Barlach Museen, Leipzig 1998, with colour ill. p. 54; exhib. cat. Ernst Barlach, Mystiker der Moderne, Hauptkirche St. Katharinen Hamburg, Ernst Barlach Gesellschaft, Hamburg 2003, p. 301
Exhibitions
Berlin/Düsseldorf 1931 (Galerie Alfred Flechtheim), Bronzen von Ernst Barlach, cat. nr. 22; Arnheim 1952 (Internationale Tentoonstelling Beeldhouwkunst), cat. nr. 11; Delft 1958 (Nieuwe Religieuze Kunst), cat. nr. 68; Antwerp 1994/1995 (Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten), Ernst Barlach, Bildhauer, Zeichner, Graphiker, Schriftsteller 1870-1938, Kat. Nr. 191/I/373; Hamburg 1977 (Ernst Barlach Haus Hamburg, Stiftung Hermann F. Reemtsma), Ernst Barlach, Plastiken, Handzeichnungen und Autographen, Nr. 54