Max Ernst

oil on canvas
53 by 64cm.
Painted in 1928.

Schlesisches Museum der Bildenden Künste, Breslau (inventory no. 23835; deaccessioned by July 8, 1937)

Buch und Kunsthandlung Karl Buchholz, Berlin, from January 1939 to January 1945 (on commission for sale from the Reichsministerium für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda)

Rosgartenmuseum, Konstanz, 1945-48 on deposit

Galería Buchholz, Madrid, 1948 and Buchholz Gallery, New York, 1949

Curt Valentin, New York (acquired from the above 1949)

Kleeman Galleries, New York (acquired from the estate of the above)

Alexandre Iolas, New York

Pierre Schlumberger

Acquired from the Estate of the above by the present owner in 1988

Munich, Hofgarten-Arkaden, Entartete Kunst, 1937, no. 16191

Peter-Klaus Schuster, Die “Kunststadt” München 1937, Nationalsozialismus und “Entartete Kunst”, Munich, 1987, p.164, illustrated p.163

Stephanie Barron, Degenerate Art. The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany, Los Angeles, 1991, p. 69, illustrated p. 232

Annegret Janda, Jörn Grabowski, Kunst in Deutschland 1905-1937: die verlorene Sammlung derNationalgalerie im ehemaligen Kronprinzen-Palais, Berlin, 1992, no. 81, p.  99

Anja Tiedemann, Die "entartete" Moderne und ihr amerikanischer Markt: Karl Buchholzund Curt Valentin als Händler verfemter Kunst, Berlin, 2013

The canvas is lined. There are retouchings scattered across the upper and lower sections of the background of the composition visible under ultraviolet light. This work is in good, stable condition.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Painted in 1928, Muschelblumen  is a remarkable example of Ernst’s artistic experimentation during a pivotal period in his career. Ernst had always looked for approaches to applying pigment that broke with traditional modes of representation, and his discovery of frottage in 1925 would prove a key moment. On holiday in Pornic, France at the time, Ernst described the moment in some detail in his Biographical Notes, ‘a rainy day in a seaside inn found me gazing at the floor boards of my room. My gaze became excited, then obsessed by the sight of the boards, where a thousand rubbings had deepened the groves [sic]. I decided then to investigate the meaning of this obsession and, to help my meditative and hallucinatory faculties, I made a series of drawings by placing on the boards sheets of paper, which I rubbed with black lead. I gazed at the drawings and, surprisingly, a hallucinatory succession of contradictory images rose before my eyes… A series of suggestions and transmutations offered themselves spontaneously’ (M. Ernst, Biographical Notes, 1925, reproduced in W. Spies, Max Ernst. Life and Work, Cologne, 2005, p. 100).

This rich, new source of imagery was rapidly refined by Ernst, initially in a series of works on paper, and then, in a further development into the associated technique of grattage in which he covered canvases with a layer of paint before placing them over an object and scraping off the pigment to reveal the patterned surface beneath. In his coquillages  – which were among the first manifestations of this technique – Ernst combined large planes of abstract colour with the almost living structures of flowers or shells created through grattage. In Muschelblumen this technique produces a work of mesmerising beauty, contrasting the delicate, organic shapes of the flowers against the dark cosmos of the background.