Leopold Gottlieb (1879-1934), PORTRET OF A BOY

oil/board, 58.5 x 45.5 cm (clear passe-partout)
signed p.d.: ' l.gottlieb '
described on the back: 'l.gottlieb | No 264 | 6184
EXHIBITED:
- Outstanding Jewish Artists from the Collection of David Malek and the Signum Foundation, Museum of the History of the City of Lodz 26.08 - 30.09.2004, Lodz 2004.
LITERATURE:
- Artur Tanikowski, Images of Humanity, Rituals of Afterlife. Leopold Gottlieb and his work, Cracow 2011, pp. 193, 269.
- Outstanding Jewish Artists from the Collection of David Malek and the Signum Foundation, Museum of the History of the City of Lodz 26.08 - 30.09.2004 [exhibition catalogue], Lodz 2004, p. 67 [repr.]

The portrait of the pale-skinned, red-faced boy dates from the 1930s, the last years of the artist's life. The painting belongs to the so-called white period. The unnatural coloring in this case serves to psychologize the image. The boy is not looking at us, he is thoughtful and his posture is closed. In portraits by Gottlieb, the arrangement of hands and pose says no less about the model than the facial expression. In 1910, a columnist for "Tygodnik Ilustrowany" wrote: "Gottlieb is a portraitist par excellence. The human face is for him that harp on which he wins all his longings. He is a master at bringing out the characteristic expression in a person's face and hands. If he perceives some essential detail, some stigma of hidden pains or sufferings of the soul, he emphasizes these details, brings them to light with incredible boldness, not even hesitating to reach that point in characterization where caricature already begins. He avoids easy and banally pretty faces. [...] from his portraits look at us really living people, cast on the canvas with the seemingly simplest means, a few yellow or gray spots [...]" (Zbierzchowski H., Z pracowni artystów polskich w Paryżu, "Tygodnik Ilustrowany" 1910, sem. II, p. 703).