Marlene Dumas Lot n° 46

Marlene Dumas The Window 1992 Oil on canvas 60 x 50 cm. Signed, dated and titled on the reverse of the stretcher 'M Dumas.The window. 1992'. Provenance Galerie Isabella Kacprzak, Cologne (with label on the reverse); private collection, Luxembourg Exhibitions Cologne 1992 (Gallery Isabella Kacprzak), Marlene Dumas, Ask me no questions and I will tell you no lies Literature Dominic van den Boogerd et al, Marlene Dumas, London 1999, p.143 with colour illus. "The Window" is an intimate painting, both in terms of its dimensions and its representational content. A figure - perhaps a woman, perhaps a little girl - fills the picture space in height. She is rendered as a purely supine figure, i.e. she turns completely away from the viewer, and is statically fixed in an almost symmetrical pictorial situation. With her arms equally bent on either side and her feet turned outwards, she stands firmly anchored in front of the dark square that can be identified as the window that gives the picture its title. Thick hair falling over her shoulders and an ankle-length shirt completely cover her head and body - with the exception of her arms. The flowing fabric of the garment finds its counterpart in the vertical transparent brushstrokes with which the artist indicates the surrounding space. The most striking detail, as it stands out in colour, are the red shoes with large pompoms, which only become fully visible through the unusual position of the feet. They carry a profound symbolic significance; multiple levels of meaning such as power, blood and sacrificial death, violence and passion play into this. The same red is to be found in the dark parts of the window and the console table in front of it, only recognizable when viewed up close; traces of blue paint also appear there. It is an unusual and extraordinarily interesting picture for Marlene Dumas, for it turns the artist's usual habits of representation on their head. In Dumas' oeuvre, the portrait is omnipresent. Her mostly female sitters are present as full portrait heads as well as half or full figures. If the body is also depicted, it is usually unclothed. The direct view of the - literally or figuratively - naked, unprotected human being is usually the focus of her work. But the protagonist of "The Window" eludes this gaze and any exposure. Fully clothed, hidden and turned away, she is sheltered and withdrawn into herself - a rare representational aspect in the artist's oeuvre. As is well known, Marlene Dumas does not work from living models or freely conceive her subjects, but uses photographic models from a wide variety of print media, including images of historical paintings or her own private photographs. She thus isolates her motifs from their former context and leaves them free of predetermined references to the gaze and associations of the viewer. In principle and quite deliberately, Dumas keeps the message of her works in abeyance; the viewer receives no guidance from her in interpreting them. Rather, the artist allows the viewer's individual biography to become a part of her artwork. Based on the viewer's personal circumstances and character traits, her works experience contrary interpretations. For example, if one person feels fear or loneliness when looking at one of her paintings, the same work may evoke a memory of a childhood experience linked to an individual feeling of security in another viewer. "The Window", silent and mysterious, holds all possibilities for the viewer's interpretations.