FROM TROLLS BACK TO ART

Lucio Fontana Attese 1967
A day at home and I was off again. This day trip had been planned for months as I wanted to go to Aix en Provence to see the Frieder Burda collection. I knew nothing about this collecter but it was his collection that interested me. Remarkable consisting of Picasso’s work as well as German and American art from the 20th century to the present day. A collection which started some 40 years ago by this German businessman who is passionate about modern and contemporary painting. He said
                             «Art collecting is supreme happiness»
I guess it is when you have money behind you to do so. His family background helped him to become one of the richest private collectors in Germany and possibly in Europe. Since 2004 he has a museum in Baden-Baden (have never been there...) and of course if something comes up, I will undoubtedly go. He started his collection with a Lucio Fontana. I am not a lover of his work but when I went into Internet to go a little further, I was stunned by the number of «Attese» he had created. Different colours and different cuts in the paper. It’s a radical style and I doubt if I would have started purchasing painting if that had been my first attemp

Expressionism is the heart of his collection with works by Kirchner, Beckmann and of course Picasso.

The Picasso are - as always - extraordinary experiences. There is one painting which is inspired by Manet’s «Olympia». I wonder which painting is preferred. For me they are both highly erotic but I guess that I have a small preference for the Picasso. 

Frieder purchased 8 of his works in the final period. A young painter at 90! He was completing three paintings a day in those final years and thousands of works were produced between the mid 60’s and his death in 1973. 
Manet Olympe


Nu Couché 1968

Could the painting below be thought of as a self portrait? Those eyes are certainly Picasso’s and the energy in the painting shows his vitality the year before he died. 


Nu assis 1968

Homme debout 1969

Child in bronze 1960

Homme au chapeau assis 1972 - Self portrait?
 This time too, there seemed to be more portraits of men - undoubtedly of Picasso and a remarkable statue of a child.


Rothko 1967
Rothko took me aback with an untitled early painting,  although it could be called «Children around a table» (1967). Even here you are beginning to see his approach to a new emerging style. Single or several colours and that is all. To understand these paintings which I think I do now, you have to walk around them, see them from a profile to understand the depth and the contrasts in a single colour.

Jackson Pollock 16 -1948

A Jackson Pollack - Composition n° 16 - now if someone would like to give me that, I would love it. Have just the place on a wall in the flat and it is exactly what I have been looking for. It’s a small painting too and so many different forms and images are revealed as you look at it closely.





I didn’t know that Willem de Kooning was also a sculptor. The large torso is big and extremely rough and uneven, not unlike the strokes in his paintings.

De Kooning "Large Torso" 1974

De Kooning 1968

Anton Henning - Interior 2004



 An artist I did not know and seemed to stand out all alone. Anton Henning. He is a young German artist known mostly for his painting although he does do sculpture and installations. The latter I may not look out for, but his painting and sculptures I will. I love the colour, the movement and once again all those curious images that emerge.... 



George Baselitz "The Herder" 1966


Another American painter and sculpter I like immensely is George Baselitz - his «The Herder» (1966) has a lot more humour than some of the huge wooden sculptures I saw in his retrospective in the MAM in Paris a few years ago.





I can’t say that I really related to some of the later American or German contemporary artists. But then I know the periods I like and am learning more and more about them. It’s not that I will stick with COBRA, Der Bleue Reiter or Die Brucke - expressionism is an art form I feel at ease with be it extremely abstract or mildly realistic.

Kirchner 1911- "Bathtub...."

August Macke "Zoo" 1912

Max Beckman "Akademi ll " 1944

Kirchner "Street scene" 1926-27

 I am going to see an Asger Jorn in Lausanne in a couple of weeks but before then am off to Helsinki. This country is the creator of the year. There design has always been one of my favorites be it for household, furniture, women’s clothing and accessories....I need nothing but oh dear, will I see something......?????

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