EUGEN VON BLAAS | A GOOD CATCH

Private collection, Chemnitz/Dresden (by the 1920s); thence by descent to the present owner

Most celebrated for being a painter of Venetian beauties, von Blaas brought his beloved Venice to life by staging dynamic, colourful compositions against the backdrop of the historic city. Here, a young girl passes by holding the catch of the day. Her beauty is enhanced by the lace-ornate blouse and the light curls framing her face, while the lobster in the basket can be read as a symbol of the harbinger of good fortune or, in this case, of falling in love. As the artist's biographer Thomas Wassibauer describes: '[von Blaas] contrasted the decaying grandeur of old Venetian stone with fresh flowers and fruit… his young people live their lives within the old walls of a still-important city, and become links in an apparently endless chain of generations who carry on the Venetian traditions and way of life' (Wassibauer, p. 19).