Lot 223: Felix Nussbaum (German, 1904-1944)

Goodbye to the fisherman
signed 'Felix Nussbaum.' (lower right)
black ink, gouache and oil on paper
48.5 x 63.5 cm.
Executed circa 1935/1936.

Felix Nussbaum was born to a wealthy assimilated German-Jewish Osnabrück merchant family. He studied in Hamburg and Berlin. The politically events of the 1930's, especially the rise of Nazism, drastically changed Nussbaum's life. In December 1932, when he stayed in Rome, his studio in Berlin was set on fire and many of his paintings were destroyed. From that time on Nussbaum had to live as a Jewish artist in exile. From Italy he fled to Belgium where he returned to Ostend, a city he liked very much from an earlier stay.

"Weit mehr Eindruck machte Ostende auf mich, wo ich Jahre vorher schon gearbeitet hatte, eine Stadt, der ich meine Liebe auf den ersten Blick geweiht hatte. Dort entstand schon in 1929 ein Grossteil meiner besten Zeichnungen, und nachdem ich 1935 als geletzer Flüchtling an einem stürmischen Februartag dorthin zurückkam, fand ich sofort wieder den engen Kontakt zu dieser Stadt, wo der Seewind die freien Wimpel an hundert Schiffsmasten gleichzeitig flattern liess." (See: Eva Berger, a.o., Felix Nussbaum, Osnabrück 1990, pp.275-276)

The authenticity of this work was kindly confirmed by Inge Jaehner, Director of the Kulturgeschichtliches Museum Osnabrück.

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