Paul Klee

Estimate

180,000 - 250,000 USD

bidding is closed

Description

Paul Klee
PALÄSTE (PALACE)
Signed Klee (lower right); also titled, dated and numbered 1940 K 16 on the mount
Gouache and watercolor on paper mounted on the artist's board
Sheet: 12 3/8 by 18 7/8 in.
31.5 by 42.8 cm

Provenance

Lily Klee, Bern (1940-46)
Klee-Gesellschaft, Bern (1946-48)
Buchholz Gallery (Curt Valentin), New York (1948-54)
Curt Valentin Gallery/Kleemann Galleries, New York (1954-55)
Roman Norbert Ketterer, Stuttgart (sold: Stuttgarter Kunstkabinett, Stuttgart, May 25, 1955, lot 410)
Saidenberg Gallery, Inc., New York (1955)
William Rand, New York (acquired from the above in 1958 and sold:
Christie's, New York, February 16, 1998, lot 40)
Private Collection (sold: Sotheby's, New York, May 11, 2000, lot 243)
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner

Exhibited

New York, Buchholz Gallery, Paul Klee, 1948, no. 35
New York, Saidenberg Gallery, Inc., Paul Klee, 1955, no. 48
New York, Saidenberg Gallery, Inc., Paul Klee Third Bi-Annual Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings, 1957, no. 47
Bern, Kunstmuseum, Paul Klee: Das Schaffen im Todesjahr, 1990, no. 277

Literature

Oeuvre-Katalogue Klee, 1940, no. 296
Jürg Spiller, Paul Klee. Das bildnerische Denken. Form - und Gestaltungslehre, 1956, Basel and Stuttgart, no. S. 457
Stefan Frey and Josef Helfenstein, Paul Klee, Verzeichnis der Werke des Jahres 1940, Stuttgart, 1991, no. 296, illustrated p. 249
Paul Klee Foundation, ed., Paul Klee Catalogue Raisonné 1940, vol. 9, Bern, 2004, no. 9315, illustrated p. 209

Catalogue Note

Palaste was e🐭xecuted in 1940, the year of his death at the age of 60🅘, and war was rampant in Europe. As typical of Klee’s late works the sheet is divided into planes of color separated by think black lines. In the present work the “palace” fills almost the entire paper seemingly pushing the other buildings out of the composition; bright red in color it radiates from the sheet.