Linear Figures with Relief, Willi Baumeister
Willi Baumeister
Linear Figures with Relief
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Willi Baumeister

Linear Figures with Relief, 1953


Blatt
292 x 477 mm
Physical Description
Coloured chalks, partially stumped, erased, black chalk, partially rubbed, on laid paper (top edge perforated)
Inventory Number
17885
Object Number
17885 Z
Acquisition
Acquired in 2019 as a bequest from Ulrike Crespo from the Karl Ströher Collection
Status
Can be presented in the study room of the Graphische Sammlung (special opening hours)

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About the Work

Baumeister’s preoccupation with stone-age cave paintings was still echoing in his works in the 1950s. It was in 1953 that he executed this richly structured drawing with its archaic symbols, which look as if they had been grouped one next to and above the other by chance. The surrounding space is vague and seems to consist of several—also temporal—layers of colour accents and partially blurred hatchings. Against this background, the ambiguous pictorial script takes on a virtually relief-like effect, which Baumeister achieved with the aid of an eraser and frottage.

About the Acquisition

The Städel Museum has the photographer, psychotherapist, philanthropist, and long-time Frankfurt resident Ulrike Crespo (1950–2019) to thank for more than ninety works ranging from classical modernism to American pop art. The paintings, drawings, and prints by Wassily Kandinsky, Otto Dix, Oskar Schlemmer, Max Ernst, Jean Dubuffet, Cy Twombly, and others originally belonged to the holdings of her grandfather, the Darmstadt-based industrialist Karl Ströher (1890–1977), who amassed an extensive art collection after World War II.

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Last update

14.05.2024