PAUL KLEE | Häuser an der Düne, 1923

Collection Mrs D. 0. Stewart, New York
Saidenberg Gallery, New York
Buchholz Gallery, New York
Private collection, Switzerland

Munich, Galerie Neue Kunst Hans Goltz, Paul Klee, Zweiter Gesamtausstellung, 1920-1925, no.120
Berne, Kunsthalle, Der grosse Bär, Paul Klee, Paul Eichenberger, Dora Lauterburg, G. Lüscher, Robert Schmitz, 1925, no. 106
Prague, Kunstverein für Böhmen, Künstlerhaus Rudolfinum-Parlament, Drei Ausstellungen : I. Jarsov Veris, Paris, Bilder und Zeichnungen. II. Paul Klee, München; 60 Aquarelle; III Bernhard Reder, Rumänien; farbige Zeichnungen, 1926, no. 29 
Hartford, Wadsworth Atheneum, Paul Klee, 1936, no. 26  
London, The Hanover Gallery, Paul Klee, 1956, no. 15
New York, City of New York Art Gallery, Paul Klee 1879-1940, Works from the collection of Mrs. Donald Ogden Stewart, 1958, no. 8
Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum, Verzameling Ella Winter, 1961-62, no. 29
Basel, Galerie Bayeler, Klee, 1963, no. 18a
Paris, Galerie Tarica, Paul Klee, 1963 Basel, Kunsthalle, Paul Klee 1879-1940, Gesamtausstellung, 1967, no. 75  

 

Paul-Klee-Stiftung, Kunstmuseum Berne, Paul Klee, Catalogue Raisonné, 2000, vol. 4, no. 2224

One framed work inspected unframed. The edges are visible. Watercolour on paper laid down on paper. Some yellowish traces are visible around the main sheet, probably inherent to a former frame. Colours slightly faded. In very good condition.
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Paul Klee began teaching at the Bauhaus in Weimar in 1921, moving to Dessau five years later. His time spent working at the progressive art school, during which the present work was executed, proved to be the most innovative and fruitful of his artistic career. It was an intensely stimulating and inspiring environment for Klee and his prolific output in these years is testament to his inexhaustible creativity. This landscape perfectly reflects Paul Klee’s endless oscillation between the figurative and the abstract and his mastery of geometric forms combined with an original color play which became his signature style. Klee dedicated much of his production to investigating the interrelationships of color by blending and interweaving opposing tones, beautifully exemplified in the present work.

At the heart of Klee's distinct and methodical approach to painting was his belief that his art was a manifestation of his innermost self. The complex beauty of his paintings became the basis for his reputation as one of the great intellectual painters of the twentieth century. According to Andrew Kagan, "Klee's greatness as a colorist and his gift as a draftsman embrace a truly extraordinary range of diversity... It must be understood that his ultimate ambitions embraced the concept of an art that would resolve all apparent contradiction, an art that would reconcile all dualities and oppositions—in other words, an art of the ultimate synthesis" (Andrew Kagan, Paul Klee at the Guggenheim Museum (exhibition catalogue), Guggenheim Museum SoHo, New York, 1993, pp. 26-27).