Claude Monet, Oskar Schlemmer, Nam June Paik

The Lempertz auctions in November are characterised by some of the biggest names from the most diverse genres in art. Claude Monet has caused a sensation with a painting the likes of which has rarely ever been auctioned in Germany before. ‘Mer agitée à Pourville’, painted in Normandy in 1882, is the only one of Monet's famous beach scenes to depict the winter season and a highlight of this phase of coastal landscapes. Oskar Schlemmer's ‘Abstrakte Figur, Freiplastik G’ from 1921/23, an important work from his Bauhaus period, was housed in the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart for many years and is now going up for auction at the Evening Sale in Cologne. The auction also includes ‘Tree of Seduction’, a work created by video art pioneer Nam June Paik during a television programme with Alfred Biolek in collaboration with the audience.

Paintings by Claude Monet rarely appear on the German auction market - but on 29th November at Lempertz in Cologne, the time has come. The atmospheric ‘Mer agitée à Pourville’, a highlight among Monet's coastal paintings, will be offered in the Evening Sale. The artist visited his brother in the seaside resort of Petites-Dalles in 1880. It was a trip with wide-reaching consequences for art history, as Monet would remain captivated by the rugged cliffs of this region for years to come.

His enthusiasm for the theme reached its peak during another stay in Normandy in around 1882. Monet stayed in a hotel near the small fishing village of Pourville, and there he explored the dynamics of the elements - for the first time also in winter. However, only one painting from this particularly stormy time of year has survived: ‘Mer agitée à Pourville’.  Monet sold the painting to the gallery owner Paul Durand-Ruel just one year after its completion. Durand-Ruel's mediation played a major role in the development of Impressionism and was particularly important for Claude Monet's career. The piece was first exhibited in New York in 1891. It will be offered with complete provenance in the Evening Sale at Lempertz Cologne on 29th November with an estimate of 3 - 4 million euros.

With ‘Abstrakte Figur - Freiplastik G’, Oskar Schlemmer created a major work of his Bauhaus period and one of the ‘most interesting sculptures of the 1920s’, as Karin von Maur, author of the catalogue raisonné on Oskar Schlemmer, classifies this work. In Schlemmer's work, the term ‘Freiplastik’ describes a figure that can only be fully perceived by the viewer by moving freely around it.

Oskar Schlemmer invested several years of preparation into the development of this form and created numerous preliminary drawings. He finally completed ‘Abstrakte Figur, Freiplastik G’ in 1923. After a long period in the repository of the Staatsgalerie in Stuttgart, the piece will be offered on the market in Cologne on 29th November.

Nam June Paik is regarded as the ‘father of video art’, Wulf Herzogenrath as one of its most important collectors. Several very special works stemming from this collaboration, which was hugely influential for contemporary art, will form part of the Evening Sale at Lempertz on 29th November in Cologne. The video installation ‘Baum der Versuchung’ (Tree of Temptation) features two important protagonists of this art form, the other being Alfred Biolek, legendary talk show host and TV pioneer. Wulf Herzogenrath was able to convince the host to create an entire video installation in his programme ‘Bei Bio’ on 12th April 1984. This work was exhibited at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin in 2019 and previously in Frankfurt am Main, Salzburg, Turin and Bremen. ‘Tree of Temptation’ will be auctioned on 29th November with an estimated price of € 200,000 - 300,000. A total of five works by Nam June Paik from the Herzogenrath Collection will be offered in the Evening Sale.

Gerhard Richter's ‘Vorhang’ (Curtain) is a piece from a famous group of works in which Richter sought a new challenge after his photo-paintings: ‘At some point I was no longer satisfied with painting photos; I took the stylistic devices of the photograph - accuracy, blurring, illusion - and used them to create doors, curtains and pipes’ (Gerhard Richter, in: Dietmar Elger, Gerhard Richter, Maler, Cologne 2002, p. 188). Estimated price € 200,00 - 300,000.

Georg Baselitz is represented with ‘Piet M.’ (oil on canvas, 165 x 100 cm), in which he portrays Piet Mondrian. The work from 2018 comes from a Swiss private collection and will go up for auction with an estimated price of € 450,000 - 600,000. The sale also features ‘Package on a table (Table empaquetée)’ by Christo. Created in 1961, this table is an early example of his wrapping art, which was to make him world-famous, and is estimated at € 100,000 - 150,000. Albert Oehlen is also represented among the top lots in the contemporary art sale with an untitled work from 1985. The square canvas has already been exhibited at the Kunsthalle Köln and the NRW-Forum Düsseldorf, among other museums. The estimated price at auction is € 180,000 - 220,000.

In addition to works by Claude Monet and Oskar Schlemmer, an early painting by Max Liebermann stands out among the high-quality selection of modern art. ‘Aus dem Grunewald’ is dated 1912. In his early park landscapes, Liebermann explored and developed the use of light in his painting, a process which was of fundamental importance for his Impressionist works, estimated price € 200,000 - 250,000.

Liebermann created the animal portrait ‘Liegender Spaniel’ (Spaniel Laying Down) just one year later. He encountered the animal on one of his trips to the Netherlands. This was a destination that the legendary art dealer Paul Cassirer also liked to visit, and he bought the painting directly from Max Liebermann. The work will now be going up for auction in Cologne at an estimate of € 150,000 – 180,000.

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Jan Bykowski
Press and Public Relations
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Tel. 0221 925729 -57