Details

Berend-Corinth/Hernad 436. Literature: Steiner, Paula (ed.), Lovis Corinth, dem Ostpreußen, Königsberg 1925, ill. p. 86; Ebering, Arthur: Meine Sammlung, Magdeburg 1937, with black and white ill.,unpaginated. Exhibitions: Kunstsammlungen der Stadt Königsberg, 1924; Lovis Corinth. Ausstellung von Gemälden und Aquarellen zu seinem Gedächtnis, Nationalgalerie Berlin, 1926, cat. no.185 (owned by Hugo Winter). Provenance: Hugo Winter, Königsberg; Dr. Arthur Ebering, Magdeburg (since July 1937 at the latest); Fritz Mittag, Magdeburg, acquired from the aforementioned in March 1938; by descent to the present owner, private collection, Southern Germany.

Description

• Large-format painting in vivid colours, with masterful brushwork and pastose application of colour
• Floral still lifes make up the largest portion of Corinth’s later oeuvre
• Many of his still lifes from the 1910s are housed today in important public collections such as the Gemäldegalerie Neue Meister, Dresden, the Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf, and the Detroit Institute of Arts

A colourful bouquet of flowers in iridescent shades of red, purple, pink and yellow glows against a dark background. Corinth applies the colour in a pastose manner and with a sweeping brush. In the later phase of his life, Corinth mainly turned to subjects such as still lifes, especially florals and landscapes. His work became increasingly self-confident, spontaneous and impulsive. By applying his colours sensitively and with a restless style, he gave the painting an expressive value that was closer to Expressionism than Impressionism. Corinth’s sensual and pleasure-loving painting reached its peak around 1910, after he had come to Berlin from Munich in 1901 and joined the Berlin Secession around Max Liebermann. Paul Cassirer became aware of his talent and immediately dedicated a solo exhibition to him; a year later he was elected to the board of the Secession. Corinth reached an additional high point in 1910 with the purchase of some of his paintings by the Hamburger Kunsthalle, accompanied by a lively international exhibition presence at the Berlin and Munich Secession, the Deutscher Künstlerbund in Darmstadt and the predecessor exhibition of the Venice Biennale, and further international exhibitions testify to the artist’s appreciation and popularity to date. His work is represented in important private and public collections worldwide, e.g. in the Nationalgalerie, Berlin, the Lenbachhaus, Munich, the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, the Tate Britain, London, the Belvedere, Vienna, the MoMA and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. This painting originally belonged to the collection of Hugo Winter (1876 in Neuss – 1967 in Jerusalem). It was exhibited in the Berlin National Gallery as early as 1926, on the occasion of a memorial exhibition for Lovis Corinth. The lender was presumably Hugo Winter. Before his emigration, Hugo Winter lived in Königsberg and ran a grain trade and a husking mill for grain and pulses together with his uncle. As a prominent Jewish family in Königsberg, the Winters were soon exposed to the persecution of Nazis. Hugo Winter was forced to leave Germany in 1934 and moved to Palestine. With the intention of returning to Germany, he deposited all of his valuables, including his art collection, in the villa of his aunt, Anna Winter, in Königsberg at Kastanienallee 26-28. The pogrom of 9-10 November 1938, a Jewish orphanage in Königsberg was set on fire, among many other crimes. Anna Winter was a great supporter of the orphanage and took all of the children affected into her home. The SS threatened to arrest her on the accusation that she had not obtained a licence to run an orphanage. Under this pressure, Anna Winter agreed to leave the villa and hand it over with all its contents to the SS. It is no longer possible to determine exactly when this painting was confiscated or sold under duress. In 1937, the artwork appeared in the collection of Dr Arthur Ebering, who published an illustration of the work in a book about his collection. In November 2023, a just and fair solution was reached with the heirs of Hugo Winter in accordance with the Washington Agreement.