Wilhelm Lehmbruck - Rückblickende

Wilhelm Lehmbruck

Rückblickende
1914

Cast stone, with a yellowish tint, lightly patinated with shellac. Height 92.2 cm. Signed 'W. LEHMBRUCK' at the back of the base. - Fine, ochre-brown colouring. Inconspicuous old cracks on back of lower legs.

Conceived as a cast-stone sculpture, Wilhelm Lehmbruck’s “Rückblickende” can be found in a number of museum collections and is among the central works in his oeuvre. Created within an artistic context spanning Paris and Berlin, the figure links a concept developed in Paris, which was dynamic and remained formally open, with the final version realised in Berlin. August Hoff particularly emphasises its “powerful spatiality” as well as the closed form established through a gently dynamic contour that invests the work with a remarkable sense of presence from every angle (August Hoff, Wilhelm Lehmbruck. Leben und Werk, Berlin 1961, p. 34).
The yellowish cast-stone work here is distinguished by a rough, porous surface that reflects a matt light due to a thinly applied patina of shellac. The support on the rear side points to Lehmbruck’s deliberate use of the material he referred to as “modelling stone” or “cement” as well as its specific requirements, and it insures the statue’s stability.
Dietrich Schubert explains that these inherent qualities of the material are particularly suited for sensitising viewers to the sculptural phenomenon: the soft transitions and muted effect of the light invest the figure with a fragile delicacy that substantially adds to the introverted gesture rather than simply accompanying it (Dietrich Schubert, Die Kunst Lehmbrucks, Dresden 1990, p. 166). The figure’s slightly twisting pose and hesitant, backward gaze accordingly suggest not an outward movement but a moment of quiet interiority.

Catalogue Raisonné

Schubert 79 A c 3

Provenance

Heckmann Collection, Munich; Kaiser Collection, Feldafing; Math. Lempertz'sche Kunstversteigerung, Cologne, Auction 520, 1 Dec. 1971, lot 681; Private ownership, Rhineland; Kunsthaus Lempertz, Cologne, Auction 910, 28 Nov. 2007, lot 206; Private ownership

Literature

Cf. Paul Westheim, Wilhelm Lehmbruck, Potsdam/Berlin 1922, plate 32/33; August Hoff, Wilhelm Lehmbruck, Berlin 1961, p. 101 (bronze version); Christoph Brockhaus (ed.), Wilhelm Lehmbruck 1881-1919. Das plastische und malerische Werk. Gedichte und Gedanken, Cologne 2005, p. 163-163, with illus.