watercolor, black crayon, paper, 29.5 x 41.5 cm, signed and dated l. d.: 'W.Strz | 1944', on the back the opinion of Janusz Zagrodzki confirming the authenticity of the work: 'The drawing is an original work by Wladyslaw Strzeminski, one of a series of drawings on a similar subject, made in 1944 | Janusz Zagrodzki | Lodz, dn. 2 IX 1979.'
The presented work is an example of Strzeminski's color works, which rarely appear on the market. It was created in occupation-era Lodz, during a very difficult period for the artist, alongside cycles of expressive drawings reflecting the wartime gehenna ("Western Belarus," "Deportations," "War to Homes," "Faces," "Landscapes and Still Lifes," "Cheap as Mud," "Hands That Are Not with Us," "To My Jewish Friends"). The figurative representation of flowers was covered with colorful patches of pure colors, which, not coincidentally, are arranged in a certain rhythm. In Strzeminski's words, when creating from nature - one "experiments," aiming either to show in objects "rhythms of irregular symmetry" or a simple "rhythm of color spots" depending on the strength of the colors. During the war period, the artist made a number of drawings, analogous to ours, for sale, which he referred to as "compromise type," some of which are now in the collection of the Museum of Art in Lodz.
ORIGIN:
- private collection, Germany (purchased from a gallery in Warsaw in 1986)
- owned by Boleslaw Hochlinger
OPINIONS:
- on the back an opinion by Janusz Zagrodzki, 1979
LITERATURE:
Wladyslaw Strzeminski 1893-1952. on the 100th anniversary of his birth, Lodz 1994, cf. cat. no. II.68, II.71, II.74, II.98, II.99.
Art theorist, painter, designer of functional printing, pioneer of the constructivist avant-garde of the 1920s and 1930s, founder of the theory of Unism. During World War I, with the rank of second lieutenant, he served in the Osowiec Fortress and was one of the few survivors of the so-called attack of the dead, and then fought in Belarus, where he was seriously wounded in May 1916 (lost an arm and a leg and sight in one eye)[2]. He was awarded the Order of St. George for his merits on the battlefield. Unable to continue his military career, he began studying at the School of Fine Arts in Moscow, but did not graduate. He then became an assistant to Kazimir Malevich at the School of Fine Arts in Vitebsk. In just a few years, he was at the forefront of the Russian avant-garde, collaborating with El Lissitsky and Alexander Rodchenko, among others. In 1921, he and his wife Katarzyna Kobro moved to Vilnius, where he co-organized the New Art Exhibition (1923) and the Block Cubist, Suprematist and Constructivist groups. He was a member of the international group Abstraction-Creation. From 1931 he stayed in Lodz, where he co-founded the International Collection of Modern Art. In 1945, he became a lecturer at the National School of Fine Arts in Lodz, which he co-founded. That same year he donated his artistic legacy to the Museum of Art in Lodz. In 1950 Strzeminski was, on the orders of the Ministry of Culture and Art, dismissed from the PWSSP on charges of not respecting the norms of the doctrine of socialist realism. He contributed much to the world avant-garde with his work. World critics rank Strzeminski among the top artists of the 20th century.
