.
Carl Spitzweg
5th February 1808 – 23th September 1885
Carl Spitzweg was born on 5th of February in 1808 in Unterpfaffenhofen, Bavaria. Although trained as a chemist, he discovered quite early his talent for drawing and his affinity with art. Spitzweg travelled extensively during his lifetime and the impressions formed by his travels greatly influenced his work. Shortly after completing his studies in pharmaceutics in 1832, he visited Italy. It was particularly in the cities of Florence, Rome, and Naples that he discovered the many significant works of Western culture which were to leave a permanent imprint on him.
A severe case of dysentery in 1833 strengthened his resolve to abandon his career as a chemist and he proceeded to commit himself solely to his painting. In June 1835, he became a member of the Munich Art Association and travelled that same year to southern Tirol with the landscape painter Eduard Schleich, the Elder.
In 1839 he completed his first painting entitled ''The Poor Poet'. Although this recurring motif would later be considered his most well-known body of work, the painting was not accepted at this time by the jury of the Munich Art Association.
As regards his graphic production, the first publication in 1844 of his own illustrations in the Munich weekly paper 'Fliegende Blätter' is considered quite significant. His visits to the Industrial Exposition in Paris and the World's Fair exhibition in London in 1851 were his first contact with the Oriental scenes which would begin to inform his work.
To the deserving painter were bestowed numerous honours during the second half of Spitzweg's lifetime: in 1865 the Bavarian Royal Merit Order of St. Michael was conferred upon him, and in 1875 he was named an honorary member of the Academy of Fine Arts.
Carl Spitzweg died on 23th of September in 1885 and was entombed in the historic South Cemetery in Munich.
He leaves behind a body of work dedicated to the townspeople who inhibit his genre scenes, and with acute and pointed, but never ill-natured humour he portrays the everday bourgeois life of his time.
Lit: Siegfried Wichmann, Carl Spitzweg. Verzeichnis der Werke, Gemälde und Aquarelle, Stuttgart: Belser, 2002.
Carl Spitzweg
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2081
Herbstauktionen
Dubuffet, Jean
1901 Le Havre - 1985 Paris.
«Mire G 154». Acrylic on wove paper, mounted on canvas. Monogrammed lower right and dated (19)83. Verso on the stretcher inscribed on a label of Gallery Beyeler, Basel, with the artist's name, dated «15 novembre 1983», titled, numbered «11202», as well as with indication of technique and dimensions. Handwritten titled again upper middle on the stretcher «G 154».
Already since the beginning of his artistic career Dubuffet was deeply impressed by the unbiased expression of disabled children's paintings, completely seperated from visual thinking. Thus he started to follow the surrealists very soon and forceful in their refusal of the aesthetic and moral values of Western culture and turned his interest towards the life of the so-called primitive people - a way which turned him into an attracted maverick. Furthermore he achieved high profile with his definition of «Art Brut» as an independent art form, first formulated in 1945, as works which arose through spontaneous impulse, inspired by imagination and foolery and which do not follow the known tracks of catalogued art anymore.
During his last years, between February 1983 to February 1984, Dubuffet painted nothing but what he called «Mires», translated «test patterns». These boldly gestural, apparently free from composed linear compositions resembling children's drawings, seem to form faces and figures, without becoming tangible at any time. This delightful and fanciful workgroup, compared to the less later executed «Non-Lieux»-paintings from luminous and cheerful colours, stem from Dubuffet's longstanding interest in graffiti. They combine aspects of Abstract Expressionism and Art Informel and anticipate the street art elevated to high art. They remind the observer of recognisable forms and seem to follow familiar structures and rules, even though they are pure gestural paintings distorting apparently familiar forms and breaking recognised rules.
Provenance: Gallery Beyeler, Basel; since then private collection Paris.
Literature: Les Editions de Minuit (Ed.), catalogue des travaux de Jean Dubuffet - Mires, Paris 1988, 
1901 Le Havre - 1985 Paris.
«Mire G 154». Acryl auf Velin, auf Leinwand kaschiert. U.r. monogr. und (19)83 dat. Verso auf dem Keilrahmen ein Etikett der Galerie Beyeler, Basel, darauf bez. mit dem Namen des Künstlers, «15 novembre 1983» dat., bet., «11202» num. sowie mit Angabe der Technik und der Maße. Mitte o. auf dem Keilrahmen nochmals handschriftlich bet. «G 154».
H. 100,7,
Bereits zu Beginn seiner künstlerischen Laufbahn ist Dubuffet tief beeindruckt von den Bildern geisteskranker Kinder, die völlig losgelöst von bildnerischem Denken entstehen und sich in reinen und unverstellten Ausdrucksformen manifestieren. So folgt er auch bald sehr konsequent den Surrealisten in ihrer Ablehnung der ästhetischen und moralischen Wertvorstellungen der westlichen Kultur und wendet sich mehr den Lebensformen sogenannter primitiver Völker zu - ein Weg, der ihn bald zum viel beachteten Einzelgänger werden lässt. Weite Bekanntheit erreicht Dubuffet darüber hinaus durch seine 1945 formulierte Definition der «Art Brut» als eigenständige Kunstform - Werke, die «durch spontane Impulse entstanden, von Phantasie und Torheit beseelt sind und sich nicht in den alten Gleisen der katalogisierten Kunst bewegen».
Während seiner letzten Lebensjahre beschäftigte sich Dubuffet von Februar 1983 bis Februar 1984 nahezu ausschließlich mit der Werkgruppe der «Mires», übersetzt «Testbilder». Diese kühn-gestischen, scheinbar von jeder gestalterischen Form losgelösten linearen Kompositionen erinnern an Kinderzeichnungen, die beim Betrachter entfernt Erinnerungen an menschliche Gesichter und Gestalten erwecken, ohne diese wirklich greifen zu können. Diese sehr reizvolle und phantasievolle Werkgruppe, im Gegensatz zu den wenig später entstandenen «Non-Lieux»-Gemälden von heller und bunter Farbigkeit, lässt deutlich Dubuffets langjähriges Interesse an der Kunst des Graffiti erkennen. Die Mires-Gemälde vereinen Aspekte des abstrakten Expressionismus mit jenen der Arte Informel und greifen der salonfähig gewordenen Street Art voraus. Sie erinnern den Betrachter an ihm bekannte Strukturen, geben dabei vor, gewohnten Regeln zu folgen und sind doch rein gestische Werke, die scheinbar Bekanntes verzerren und mit allen bekannten Regeln brechen.
Provenienz: Galerie Beyeler, Basel; seitdem Privatsammlung Paris.
Literatur: Les Editions de Minuit (Hrsg.), catalogue des travaux de Jean Dubuffet - Mires, Paris 1988,