Willi Baumeister

Margarete Baumeister, Stuttgart (the artist's wife) 
Galerie Gmurzynska, Cologne
Acquired from the above by the late owner in 1979

Berlin, Nationalgalerie & Frankfurt, Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Willi Baumeister, Zeichnungen und Gouachen, 1972, no. 92
Mönchengladbach, Städtisches Museum, Rationale Spekulationen, Konstruktivistische Tendenzen in der europäischen Kunst zwischen 1915 und 1930 ausgewählt aus deutschen Privatsammlungen, 1972, no. 13, illustrated in the catalogue

Dietmar J. Ponert, Willi Baumeister: Werkverzeichnis der Zeichnungen, Gouachen und Collagen, Cologne 1988, illustrated p. 84

Executed on cream wove card, not laid down, floating in the mount and taped to the mount in two places on the upper edge. There is some light scuffing to the blue elements and the medium has faintly discoloured. Otherwise this work is in overall good condition. Colours: overall fairly accurate in the printed catalogue, though slightly warmer in the original.
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'Apart from colour, the richest means of expression, the drawings of Willi Baumeister unite the freedom of creative fantasy and the highest awareness. They display progression of perfectionism. A construction with many fine and very fine lines, spatial and plastic effects, different grades of clarity and every other graphic means at his command' (Hans Hildebrandt quoted in Willi Baumeister 1889-1955 (exhibition catalogue), Leonard Hutton Galleries, New York, 1978,p. 5).

Dating from the early part of Willi Baumeister’s career, when the artist was seeking to forge an entirely new creative language governed by geometrical shape and composition, Figur mit Kreis is a masterful exposition of mechanical form rendered elegant through aesthetic means. The figural element is almost entirely abandoned in favour of an abstract lexicon, with only the suggestion of a small circular ‘eye’ within the central circle indicating a human presence. The influence of Fernand Léger and Le Corbusier is evident in the celebration of industrial forms within Figur mit Kreis: Baumeister exhibited with Léger in Berlin in 1922, arguably suggesting that the two artists were inspired by each other’s work. Baumeister focussed primarily on the depiction of the figure within this early stage of his painting, aiming to suggest human form through its most elemental components. In it’s pioneering examination of ‘portraiture’, Figur mit Kreis is a powerful example of Baumeister’s creative concerns and ideals during this decade.