Ticino Art Museum shows Kirchner and the “Red-Blue” group
Published: Thursday, Nov 14th 2024, 13:00
Updated At: Thursday, Nov 14th 2024, 12:00
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The Museo d'arte della Svizzera italiana (Masi) in Lugano is dedicating a small, fine exhibition to the expressionist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. It makes direct reference to the Basel artist group "Rot-Blau", which was founded in Mendrisiotto and was active in Ticino.
The painting "Alpküche", which Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880-1938) created in 1918, is characterized by deep, bright yellow, bold areas of colour and a distorted perspective. It shows the interior of his dwelling on the Stafelalp above Davos. The open door provides a view of the Tinzenhorn on the horizon - a motif that appears again and again in the German Expressionist's work.
The loan from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection in Madrid is one of ten paintings that focus on the Swiss mountain landscape and its inhabitants around Davos. Among them is "Bauernmittag", a painting characterized by bold brushstrokes, which was shown in the propaganda exhibition "Entartete Kunst" (Degenerate Art) in Munich in 1937, as it represented an example of "bad art" according to the criteria of the Nazi regime and "insulted" the peasantry.
New image of people and landscape
The exhibition "Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and the Artists of the Red-Blue Group" uses works by the Expressionist group from the Masi collection to establish a direct link to Kirchner's work.
It becomes clear how strongly the work of the Basel group was inspired by their "mentor", but also by Ticino. The young men from Basel, who had become acquainted with Kirchner's art at two major exhibitions at the Kunsthalle Basel and the Kunstmuseum Winterthur, regularly worked side by side with their role model in his house near Davos.
The clearly defined areas of color, the slightly distorted perspective and the depressed facial expression in Werner Neuhaus' painting "Der Malerfreund Albert Müller" bear witness to this closeness. As in Kirchner's work, the "Red and Blues" also show a newly perceived image of people and landscapes moved by emotion. The Expressionists' colors are also not those of nature, but express the painter's subjective feelings.
In 1925 and 1926, contacts between the artists' association and Kirchner intensified. The latter designed a room dedicated to young Swiss art at the "International Art Exhibition" in Dresden and invited the "Red-Blue" members Albert Müller, Paul Camenisch, Hermann Scherer and Philipp Bauknecht to take part in the exhibition.
Kirchner's longing for Ticino
The carefully curated show at the LAC (Lugano Arte e Cultura) cultural center clearly shows how the Davos mountain landscape influenced Kirchner and the southern Swiss landscape influenced the "Red-Blue" group.
Müller, Camenisch and Scherer not only founded their artists' association on New Year's Eve 1924 in Castel San Pietro in Mendrisiotto, they also painted regularly in southern Ticino. One example of this is the painting "Man in the Vines" by Paul Camenisch. Due to the strong Ticino connection, it is even speculated that the name of the group of artists could refer to the colors of the Ticino coat of arms.
A letter dated May 15, 1923 to Wilhelm Schwarzmann, who lived in the southern canton, shows that Kirchner also had a longing for Ticino. In it, Kirchner asks his friend to look for a cottage for him in or around Locarno: "I have a great desire to be in a warm climate and your stories have increased this desire even more."
However, he was not to move to the south again. Kirchner, who had moved to Davos in 1923 traumatized by the First World War and weakened by drug and alcohol abuse, became increasingly mentally unwell from 1934 onwards.
The "Red-Blue" group disbanded in 1927 after Müller died of typhoid fever in Ticino at the end of 1926 and Scherer in mid-May 1927. Müller's death was a particularly heavy blow for Kirchner, who described his Basel pupil as his "only friend".
After the Nazis confiscated over 600 of Kirchner's paintings in 1937 and forced the annexation of Austria in 1938, Kirchner destroyed several of his works and took his own life near Davos on June 15.
The exhibition "Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and the artists of the Red-Blue Group" can be seen from 17.11. to 23.03.2025 at the Museo d'arte della Svizzera italiana (Masi) in Lugano at the LAC site.
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