Brahms, Johannes

playfully suggesting that viewing Klinger's recent Brahms-Fantasie is a more enjoyable prospect than listening to his own recent piano works [Opp.116 and 117], asking him to visit so that he may see it, and requesting him to allow some time for the viewing ("...die neueste Brahms-Phantasie nur anzuschauen, ist mehr Genuß als die 10 letzten zu hören...")

1 page, oblong 8vo (9 x 14cm), on a correspondence card, autograph address-panel, postmarked Vienna, 31 December 1893, some slight smudging

for Brahms's letter of 29 December, cf Kalbeck, iv, p. 336, and Styra Avins and Josef Eisinger (eds.), Johannes Brahms. Life and Letters (1997), 710

Condition is described in the main body of the cataloguing, where appropriate
"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. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Brahms's music inspired the artist Max Klinger to produce a Brahms-Fantasy, a cycle of 41 drawings, etchings and lithographs based on his vocal works. The portfolio appeared in 1894, but Brahms had evidently received an advance copy and invited his friend Hanslick (the dedicatee of the "Liebeslieder" Waltzes op.39), to visit and view them.  Brahms was touched by Klinger's work, acknowledging in a letter written two days before: "Perhaps it has not occurred to you to imagine what I must feel as I contemplate your pictures. I see the music, along with the lovely words - and then quite imperceptibly your wonderful drawings carry me further; looking at them, it seems as if the music resounded into the infinite and expressed all I could have said, more clearly than the music can...".  His self-deprecating comments concern the Intermezzi Opp.116 and 117, amongst the finest compositions of his later years.