WINTER, FRITZ
1905 Altenbögge–1976 Herrsching

Title: Triebkräfte der Erde.
Date: 1944.
Technique: Oil on paper.
Measurement: 29.5 x 21 cm.
Frame: Framed.



Provenance:
- - G. Kellerhals Collection, Frankfurt am Main

- Private collection Denmark


Exhibition:
- Westfälisches Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, Münster 1981/82

- Städtische Galerie im Beethoven Haus, Villingen-Schwenningen 1982


Literature:
- Lohberg, Gabriele: Fritz Winter – Leben und Werk, mit Werkverzeichnis der Gemälde und einem Anhang der sonstigen Techniken, Munich 1986, cat. rais. no. 795, ill.

- Exhib. cat. Triebkräfte der Erde (Wanderausstellung), Westphalian State Museum of Art and Cultural History, Münster 1981–1982 / Municipal Gallery in the Beethoven House, Villingen-Schwenningen 1982, cat. no. 68, ill.



- Winter’s series ‘Triebkräfte der Erde’ ranks among the most important contemporary testimonies to ‘internal emigration’ in Germany

- One of the artist’s most sought-after creative phases

- Fritz Winter is one of the most significant representatives of abstract painting in Germany and a co-founder of the artists’ group "Zen 49"



The Path into “Inner Emigration”

“Where is truly creative work that has not emerged from depths that cannot be measured, from expanses that cannot be seen? Only the image of those depths and expanses reveals the world to us.”

— Fritz Winter, quoted in Martina Ripphausen, Die Feldskizzen Fritz Winters 1939–1945, Aachen, 1994, p. 377

Fritz Winter was born in 1905 in Altenbögge in the Ruhr region, the son of a West Prussian mining family. After completing an apprenticeship as an electrician in 1922, he worked underground in a coal mine for nearly a year beginning in 1926—an experience that would accompany and inspire him throughout his life.

In 1924, he discovered a passion for painting and drawing, which led him to apply to the Bauhaus in Dessau in 1927, where he was accepted. There, he studied under Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, and Oskar Schlemmer. It was above all his exchange with Kandinsky that inspired Winter to venture into previously unknown territory: abstract art enabled him to create new images rather than mere representations of nature.

Winter gained recognition early in his career. By the early 1930s, museums had already begun acquiring and exhibiting his works. In 1937, however, his art was denounced by the National Socialists as “degenerate,” and his works were removed from museum collections. As a so-called “degenerate” artist, Winter’s access to artistic materials was severely restricted—effectively amounting to a ban on painting—which was ultimately sealed in 1939 when he was drafted into military service.



Promise in the Darkness

Against this background, the series Driving Forces of the Earth (Triebkräfte der Erde) stands out within Winter’s oeuvre as both a historical document and a singular artistic achievement. The approximately fifty-seven sheets were created in what appears to have been an almost manic burst of productivity during January and February 1944, while Winter was recovering in Dießen during a home visit after suffering a severe wartime injury.

Owing to the scarcity of materials, all works in this series were executed on thin typing paper, which Winter saturated with an oil-based emulsion. For the ground, he used a board coated with brown pigment, pressing it onto the sheet to transfer colour and thereby create the characteristic amorphous, woodgrain-like pattern that occasionally shimmers through the composition.

Over this initial layer, Winter applied a second veil of colour, which in the present work hovers over the ground in earthy tones of dark brown and delicate ochre. In a third stage, he used stencils to apply organic and crystalline forms in white, yellow, blue, orange, and red. Although these colours are only intermittently fully opaque, they lend the composition a complex luminosity.

They evoke crystals bringing light into the darkness of the earth—natural phenomena Winter must have observed during his time underground and now translates onto paper. White striations glowing at the edges suggest roots embedded in the soil.

It is particularly the superimposition of three distinct layers that makes the work so compelling. This multidimensional, enigmatic space can be understood as a metaphor for life itself, for human existence in dark times. In the world Winter experienced in 1944—a world revealing its ugliest and darkest side—beauty could nevertheless still be found each day through the observation of nature.

To this day, the series is regarded as one of the most powerful testimonies of the “inner emigration” of a German artist during the Third Reich. Werner Haftmann, who wrote a landmark essay on Driving Forces of the Earth in 1957, referred to these works as images of earthly life (Erdlebenbilder). Rather than depicting the overt beauty of nature, the works allow the viewer to experience the underlying energies and processes concealed beneath the surface.

They function as metaphors for the origins of nature and reminders of its constant renewal—thus becoming symbols of hope for a better future.

Sophie Ballermann



Estimated shipping costs for this lot:
The lot is unsuitable for parcel shipping. Transport only by shipping company after consultation following the auction.

additional shipping insurance


Shipping insurance

up to total invoice amount of 25,000 Euros: max. 41.65 Euro

over a total invoice amount of 25,000 Euros: 1.8 o/oo


USA by individual arrangement after the auction.




#Fritz Winter #Informel #ZEN 49 #Lyrical Abstraction #Germany #Post-War Art #Works on paper #Abstract #Oil #1940s #Post War.







In accordance with §26 UrhG (German Copyright Act), VAN HAM is obliged to pay a statutory resale royalty on the sale proceeds of all original works of fine art and photography whose authors have not been deceased for 70 years prior to the end of the calendar year of the sale. The buyer shall contribute 1.5% of the hammer price to this fee.