Lot 1166 | Girl from Knoblauchsland

SCHIESTL, RUDOLF
1878 Würzburg - 1931 Nuremberg

Title: Girl from Knoblauchsland.
Or: Die Grünlachsbäuerin.
Technique: Oil on wood.
Measurement: 63 x 53,5cm.
Notation: Signed and dated lower right: Rudolf / Schiestl / 1916.
Frame/Pedestal: Framed.
Verso:
On the frame label with inscription.

Provenance:
Private ownership, Germany.

The brothers Rudolf and Matthäus Schiestl have unjustly received far too little attention from the art historians of the last 150 years. In their time, they played a central role for art in southern Germany and far beyond its borders. The work of the two is closely connected with their homeland in Franconia: In ceaseless artistic striving they give us today authentic witnesses of the Franconian landscape and people. This region, which was poor and strongly influenced by agriculture at that time, with its hard-working people, stands in particular in Rudolf Schiestl's work in a formative contrast to the splendid, brilliant and clear colors - in this way he evokes the life and joy of the country people, despite all the meager circumstances. In doing so, he - like his brother Matthäus - used a remarkably matter-of-fact realism, contrary to the art-theoretical tendencies prevalent at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, and can therefore be seen as a forerunner of upcoming tendencies. At the same time, in composition and pictorial structure, he refers to the great German masters of the 15th and 16th centuries and portrays his protagonists with great dignity.
In the oral tradition, the iconic depiction of the "Girl from Knoblauchsland" (lot 1166) is considered the "Mona Lisa of Georgensgmünd": reproductions of this very well-known painting were on the walls of numerous southern German homes and were also printed in school textbooks. Thus, the depicted girl was able to shape the cultural identity of Franconia and become an icon of the region. Numerous studies of the painting give evidence of to Rudolf Schiestl's intensive artistic engagement with the motif and the composition.
The work of his brother Matthäus also shows an intensive reference to the Franconian region with its people and customs; he depicts above all sagas and legends as well as Christian and allegorical motifs in his own coloring and unmistakable pictorial composition in the native landscape. Both artists were able to emancipate themselves from the sculptural tradition they learned in their father's workshop (Lot 1167) and establish themselves as painters and graphic artists. Their reputation developed far beyond regional and national borders.

The paintings offered in this "Fine Art"-auction are enriched by another nearly 50 lots that VAN HAM is offering in a monographic ONLINE ONLY auction from May 26 to June 7: Numerous painting, drawings and (pre)studies of larger works (for example, the aforementioned studies of the "Girl from Knoblauchsland") are offered in the ONLINE ONLY auction. With the offered lots from an important, renowned collection of a South German patron, VAN HAM can provide a comprehensive insight into the work of the two brothers, which is rarely accessible to the public, and present a real rarity on the international art market.