Born into a reputable family of Russian nobility, Marianne von Werefkin began her artistic career taking private lessons under the eminent artist of Russian realism, Ilya Repin. After a hunting accident, in which the artist lost the middle finger on her painting hand, she began the laborious process of recovering mobility, eventually achieving a level of precision in realist painting that led to her moniker the ‘Russian Rembrant’. It was following her involvement in Der Blaue Reiter, however, alongside Wassily Kandinsky, Gabriele Münter, Franz Marc and August Macke to name a few, that Werefkin developed a style completely her own. Werefkin’s paintings embody the freedom of expression lauded by Der Blaue Reiter and her luminous palettes, with their expressive brushstrokes and exploration of the spiritual in art, mark an important moment in the development of European modern art.

Die Erwartung (The Expectation) likely dates from the second half of the 1920s, when the artist was living and working in Ascona. The 1920s marked a period of intense creativity and stability for Werefkin following her protracted separation from Alexej von Jawlensky. Werefkin met Jawlensky in 1892 and their meeting would mark the beginning of an intense and tumultuous relationship, during which for ten years Werefkin would refrain from painting in order to champion the career of her partner. Following the couple’s split in 1921, Werefkin focussed more wholly on honing her signature style. Werefkin’s critical acclaim was evident as she participated in the Venice Biennale that same year and only one year later she co-founded the Municipal Museum of Modern Art in Ascona. In its avant-garde evocation of colour and form Die Erwartung (The Expectation) is testament to the unique creative vision of Werefkin and her tireless desire to push the boundaries of traditional pictorial representation.

Here, Werefkin’s choice of medium reflects the artist’s deep appreciation of Medieval and Byzantine art, as well as the Russian icons for which tempera was the primary medium. Werefkin’s mother had been a painter of icons and had encouraged her daughter’s talent from a young age. Consequently, Werefkin infuses her painting with a spiritual element through this link to religious icon painting. In contrast to these icons, however, Werefkin applies colour using subtly shifting hues that amplify the dynamism of the scene and allow for a greater interplay of light across the scene. In Die Erwartung (The Expectation) colour is liberated from its role as a means for mimetic representation and instead becomes a means of expression. As with the work of the Symbolists, Werefkin employs colour to provoke a spiritual response in the viewer. This rich understanding of colour reflects the artist’s earlier involvement in Der Blaue Reiter as well as her deep understanding of the various developments in colour theory that were sweeping across early twentieth century Europe.

In Werefkin’s Die Erwartung (The Expectation) it is also the landscape that acts as the vessel for conveying the spiritual. The two solitary figures in the foreground are not the sole focus of the painting. Turned away from the viewer, these figures highlight the real focus: that of the majesty of the natural world. Werefkin exacerbates the landscape of Ascona using a cacophony of colour and swirling brushstrokes. Werefkin breaks the composition up with three spindly trees, a choice that appears both visual and symbolic. Whilst the strong vertical lines of the trees counter the undulations of the mountains, their presence alludes to the symbolic representation of the crucifixion, as is shown in Rembrandt’s renowned etching The Three Trees.

Die Erwartung (The Expectation) remained in the artist’s collection for the rest of Werefkin’s life before then passing into her estate and has never before been seen on the market.