478. Karl Schmidt-Rottluff (German, 1884-1976) Hayfield with Storm Clouds Signed “S. Rottluff” l.r., identified on a loan label from Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, affixed to the backing. Watercolor on Centaur paper, sheet size 19 3/4 x 28 7/16 in. (50.2 x 72.2 cm), framed. Condition: Paper tape hinged to backing mat board, subtle mat burn, subtle skinning verso. Provenance: Anthony’s, Johannesburg, South Africa; collection of Selma H. and Irving M. Sobin, Boston; by family descent to a private New England collection. Literature: 20th Century Germanic Art from Private Collections in Greater Boston, Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University, March 23 to May 1, 1961 [exh. cat.]. Exhibitions: Modern German Sculpture, Painting and Industrial Art, Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University, June 18 to August 22, 1958 (lent by Selma H. and Irving M. Sobin), loan no.118.58; 20th Century Germanic Art from Private Collections in Greater Boston, Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University, March 23 to May 1, 1961 (lent by Selma H. and Irving M. Sobin), loan no. 49.61. N.B. Schmidt-Rottluff was a founding member of “Die Brücke,” a group which sought to express “faith in the future, the strength of youth, the value of directness and authenticity, and the rejection of the older forces of the establishment” through art.1 Though this group was active only from 1905 to 1911, the radical anti-academic model they championed helped to bring Expressionism into wide acceptance. By the time Schmidt-Rottluff received public acclaim for his work, the Nazis were growing in power. In the years leading up to World War II, the Nazis denounced his work as “degenerate,” seizing it from German museums and banning him from painting in 1941.2 He resumed art-making after World War II, returning to Germany from self-imposed exile and teaching at the Hochschule der Bildenden Künste in West Berlin. In 1957, a year before the present work was exhibited at the Busch-Reisinger Museum, Schmidt-Rottluff was awarded a civil class “Pour le Merite” medal by the first German Republican president Theodor Heuss. This order, which originated with the Kingdom of Prussia, recognizes the highest German achievements in the arts. 1. Lucius Grisebach, “Brücke, Die,” In Grove Art Online, Oxford Art Online, http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/ grove/art/T011659 (accessed April 19, 2011). 2. http://www.bruecke-museum.de/englrottluff.htm
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