Lot 558
Käthe Kollwitz (1867-1945)
Lot 558 Details
Käthe Kollwitz (1867-1945), German
RUHT IM FRIEDEN SEINER HÄNDE (GRABRELIEF), 1935/36, LATER CAST
Bronze relief with dark-brown patina; signed "Kollwitz" and stamped with foundry mark "H. Noack Berlin" on the front bottom edge
13.5 x 12 x 3.5 in — 34.6 x 31 x 8.9 cm
Estimate $12,000-$18,000
Additional Images
Provenance:
The Helen and Walter Zwig Foundation Collection, Toronto
Note:
This bronze relief was created for the family grave, which Käthe Kollwitz and her siblings had acquired for themselves and their spouses at the central cemetery in Berlin-Friedrichsfelde. The younger sister Lisbeth Stern, to whom Käthe Kollwitz was particularly connected throughout her life, had asked the artist for a sculptural work for the grave after the death of her husband in 1934.
The relief shows "two large motherly hands, who wrap someone who has passed in their cloak, and the person who passes over - only the face can be seen - pulls the cloak around him."
Kollwitz found inspiration in the poem "West-Eastern Divan" by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: 'God is the Orient! / God is the Occident! / North and southern terrain / Rests in the peace of his hands'.