Lovis Corinth (1858 Tapiau - 1925 Zandvoort) Pair... Lot 1829

Lovis Corinth (1858 Tapiau - 1925 Zandvoort) Pair of centaurs This furiously painted work with the eagerly merging pair of centaurs was created in 1917, a few years after Corinth suffered a stroke in 1911 - at the height of his artistic creativity - from which he only gradually recovered (also by painting). For Corinth, seduction, sensuality and lust were among the essentially important themes that he took up again and again. Hardly any other motif is as central to Corinth's oeuvre as the nude. He depicted the natural, unclothed human body in different variations, both as a model in the studio and in mythological contexts as well as in sensual and intimate scenes. Corinth's female nudes have an immediately sensual aura, but his mythological depictions are also an expression of sensual, tangible desire, as in the present painting. The hybrid creature depicted here, the centaur, is the traditional epitome of vitality and virility in its union of horse and man, and Corinth probably also understood it in this sense. In contrast, the woman depicted here as a centaur is both a seductress and an object of lust. Just like Frank Wedekind's "Lulu" or Oscar Wilde's demonic "Salomé", such a sensual female centaur was an expression of secret male erotic dream fantasies of her time. Franz von Stuck's "Sensuality" and "Sin", executed as paintings and etchings between 1889 and 1912, certainly represented a high point in art. Wilhelm Trübner had already painted pairs of centaurs in 1878/80, followed by Franz von Stuck, who was very successful with this motif. Corinth, who lived in Munich from 1884-1901, would certainly have been familiar with his colleague's works. However, he came to completely different conclusions, as for him the mythological subject matter was merely a pretext to show his own interpretation of primal animal sensuality in accordance with his nature. Oil on canvas, mounted on cardboard. R. o. sign. a. dat. 1917. 54.5 cm x 80.5 cm. Frame. Exhibition: Galleria d'Arte, Rome 1963. Cf.: Georg Biermann, Der Zeichner Lovis Corinth, Dresden 1924, p. 56 (with illus. of the drawing "Studie zum Kentaur / Berlin 1911"); Charlotte Berend-Corinth: "Lovis Corinth. Die Gemälde", newly edited by Béatrice Hernad, Munich 1992, Wvz.-No. 1002, p. 907. Provenance: Collection Palais Schwarzenberg, Vienna, auctioned in 1932 by the Viennese auction house Albert Kende, cat. no. 127 (with illus. under the title "Satyr mit Nymphe", dat. 1912); private property England; private collection Italy; auction Ketterer Munich, 02.06.2006, lot 324. Oil on canvas, laid down on canvas. Signed and dated 1917. Mentioned in the catalogue raisonné, no. 1002.