Emil Nolde
, German, 1867-1956
Title
Rain over a MarshDatec.1938
MediumWatercolour on rice paper
Dimensions
42.1 x 53.7 cm
Signedlower right (in watercolour): Nolde
Credit LineBequeathed, Lady Dorothy Mayer, 1975
Object numberNGI.7767
DescriptionNolde executed a series of atmospheric watercolour compositions, which he called his ‘unpainted pictures‘ from 1938 onwards, while the Nazis were in power. In 1941 he was prohibited from practising as an artist, which meant he could not exhibit his work publicly or sell his art. Over 1,000 of his paintings and drawings were confiscated during the war years. Created between 1938 and 1945, when he retired to the village of Seebüll in northern Germany, these small, immediate images were inspired by the flat, marshy landscape and open skies near his home. He called these pictures ‘unpainted’ because, being officially banned from practising as an artist, by law they should not have been produced at all. In addition, many were intended for translation into ‘real‘ paintings in oil at a future date. He did in fact use some of these watercolour studies as the basis for larger works in oil. The watercolours were painted in secret and rarely exhibited in his lifetime, and very few sheets passed into other hands. Nolde painted most of these landscapes on Japanese paper using brushes dripping with colour. Through his skilful use of watercolour he manages to give a very real sense of the rain-heavy clouds offset by the bright colours of the buildings.
March 2016
ProvenanceDr Martin Urban; Marlborough Fine Art Ltd.; bequeathed, Lady Dorothy Mayer, 1975 Exhibition HistoryEmil "Nolde", Marlborough Fine Art Ltd., London, 1965
Master European Drawings From the Collection of the National Gallery of Ireland, Ackland Art Museum, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Colorado Springs Fine Arts Centre, Colorado; Art Gallery, University of Maryland, College Park; Milwaukee Art Museum, Wisconsin; Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indiana; The Minneapolis Museum of Art, Minnesota; The Santa Barbara Museum of Art, California; National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, 1983
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