Franz von Stuck German, 1863-1928

probably the Estate of the artist

A.Heilmann, Die Plastik Franz von Stucks, Phd Diss., Munich University 1985, p.93, 405, no.14 (listed as missing)

This rediscovered relief is first documented in a photograph preserved in the Stuck Estate dating to 1892, printed by the Münchener Kunst- und Verlags-Anstalt Dr. E. Albrecht & Co. It is next reproduced twice in Otto Julius Bierbaum‘s seminal 1893 monograph, once as a single work on p.43 (see fig.1, left) and again on p.83 decorating the artist‘s first studio at Theresienstraße 148 (fig.2).

In 1891, a few years before the creation of the relief, Stuck painted a work entitled Die Versuchung (The Temptation) which treats the iconography of the temptation of Adam more conventionally than in the relief. In the middle of the picture, between Adam and Eve, Stuck positioned the Tree of Knowledge around which a giant snake has curled itself. Eve, who has already been seduced by the snake and sampled the forbidden fruit, is shown timidly offering it to Adam. Torn between accepting or refusing the apple, Adam's leg is simultaneously being enveloped by the devil’s tail. Stuck clearly used the forbidden fruit as a metaphor of the seductive and erotic power of woman. This is reflected not only in the painting’s title but also in Eve’s gesture: while offering him the apple in one hand, she clasps her breast in the other.

For the relief, Stuck altered the iconography in an interesting way. The tree is left out entirely. Instead, the devil uses the woman herself as the temptress of man. Rather than the apple, Eve extends the snake’s head, in which the apple is clearly visible between the fangs of its gaping mouth. Both snake and woman conjoin in their attempt to seduce man, just as they do in Stuck’s famous later paintings of Die Sünde (The Sin). Another interesting aspect of the relief is the opposing representations of the two nudes. While Adam resembles antique statues from the 5th century BC, Eve is emphatically modern, sensitively modelled from nature and stylized in a way that is typical of von Stuck.

If the inception of the relief dates to circa 1892, then there was clearly a lengthy period of time before Stuck revisited the subject, as it was not until 1912 and 1916 that he treated the topic of Adam and Eve again, and then only in paintings. In the meantime he had become preoccupied with a fascination for representing the ultimate femme fatale, as his famous series of Die Sünde testifies.

A remarkable feature of the relief is the way Stuck carved their names next to their heads, as if the unusual subject matter had to be explained. Although inscriptions occur in Stuck’s works now and again, they are normally stylised like inscriptions from antiquity. The spontaneous addition of these names suggests Stuck regarded the relief as a vehicle for private study rather than for public consumption.

The relief probably remained in Stuck’s studio, as a small printed label affixed to the rear, numbered 639 (see fig.3, left) is of the same typeface as those found on other works from his estate such as the Sisyphus (Voss op.cit., no.538) and Wettlauf (no.604). They were stored after his death in a Munich warehouse during the 1930's identified as his personal property and consequently it can be assumed that this relief numbered amongst them.

The relief was obviously important to Stuck or it would not have featured so prominently in Bierbaum's book, for which Stuck himself contributed the illustrations. It played a considerable role in the development of his famous paintings of Die Sünde and it remains an important document of his sculptural work.

We are grateful to Prof. Thomas Raff, Munich, for his assistence in cataloguing this lot.

RELATED LITERATURE
O.Bierbaum, Franz Stuck, Munich 1893, p.83, 169;
F.von Ostini, 'Franz Stuck' in Die Kunst, vol.9 Munich 1904, p.36
Franz von Stuck 1863-1928, exh.cat., Museum Villa Stuck, Munich 1982, p.67, fig.3;
H.Voss, Franz von Stuck. Werkkatalog der Gemälde, Munich 1973