Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
Still Life with Jug and African Bowl1912

On view:

Broad Contemporary Art Museum, floor 3

Oil painting still life with a tall floral bouquet in a gray tin, brown ceramic pitcher, and round basket on a green-toned table, with small figures and decorative objects in the distance

Artist or Maker: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
Germany, also active Switzerland 1880-1938
Title: Still Life with Jug and African Bowl
Place Made: Germany
Date Made: 1912
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 55 x 44 x 2 1/2 in. (139.7 x 111.76 x 6.35 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of Richard Smooke, Michael Smooke, and Barry Smooke in honor of their parents, Marion and Nathan Smooke
Accession Number: M.2003.90
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: Modern Art
Curatorial Notes: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner decorated his studio in Berlin with motifs copied from African, Indian, Indonesian, and Pacific Islander art. Kirchner’s fascination with non-European art was fueled by the founding of German colonies in the South Pacific and Africa in the late nineteenth century. The looting of art and artefacts from these colonies fed the collections at new ethnographic museums throughout Germany, where Kirchner and the other Expressionists encountered them removed from their original context. Still Life with Jug and African Bowl includes depictions of sculptures by Kirchner in the style of African woodcarving— similar to the sculpture displayed nearby, Dancer with Necklace.

Like other artists in this gallery, Kirchner was attacked as “degenerate” by the Nazis. Still Life, originally in the collection of Kunsthalle Mannheim, was confiscated in 1937 after the German Propaganda Ministry announced a “cleansing” of all public museums.

Wall label, 2021.
Provenance: The artist (1880-1938); [Galerie Ernst Arnold, Dresden]; [sold in 1926 to Kunsthalle Mannheim (inv. no. 632)]; confiscated August 28,1937 in the action “Entartete Kunst” (“Degenerate Art”) by the Deutsches Reich/Reichsministerium für Volksaufklӓrung und Propaganda, Berlin; stored at Depot Schloss Schӧnhausen, storage of “internationally usable” works of art, from August 1938; [by exchange on March 7, 1940 to Galerie Ferdinand Möller, Cologne]; [sold in1943 to Kunsthändler Ferdinand Mӧller, Berlin, until 1949, registration by Kurt Reutti November 1946]; possibly sold to Baron Philippe Lambert (1930-2011), Brussels]; [sold in 1987 at Christie’s, London, June 29, 1987, Lot 33]; to Nathan (1909-1991) and Marion Smooke (1916-2001), Beverly Hills; Estate of Nathan and Marion Smooke; given in 2003 by their children Richard, Michael, and Barry Smooke to LACMA.
Selected Bibliography: Gordon, Donald E. Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.1968. Catalogue raisonné, no. 554, p. 346, illustrated.

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
Still Life with Jug and African Bowl1912

On view:

Broad Contemporary Art Museum, floor 3

Artist or Maker: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
Germany, also active Switzerland 1880-1938
Title: Still Life with Jug and African Bowl
Place Made: Germany
Date Made: 1912
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 55 x 44 x 2 1/2 in. (139.7 x 111.76 x 6.35 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of Richard Smooke, Michael Smooke, and Barry Smooke in honor of their parents, Marion and Nathan Smooke
Accession Number: M.2003.90
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: Modern Art
Curatorial Notes: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner decorated his studio in Berlin with motifs copied from African, Indian, Indonesian, and Pacific Islander art. Kirchner’s fascination with non-European art was fueled by the founding of German colonies in the South Pacific and Africa in the late nineteenth century. The looting of art and artefacts from these colonies fed the collections at new ethnographic museums throughout Germany, where Kirchner and the other Expressionists encountered them removed from their original context. Still Life with Jug and African Bowl includes depictions of sculptures by Kirchner in the style of African woodcarving— similar to the sculpture displayed nearby, Dancer with Necklace.

Like other artists in this gallery, Kirchner was attacked as “degenerate” by the Nazis. Still Life, originally in the collection of Kunsthalle Mannheim, was confiscated in 1937 after the German Propaganda Ministry announced a “cleansing” of all public museums.

Wall label, 2021.
Provenance: The artist (1880-1938); [Galerie Ernst Arnold, Dresden]; [sold in 1926 to Kunsthalle Mannheim (inv. no. 632)]; confiscated August 28,1937 in the action “Entartete Kunst” (“Degenerate Art”) by the Deutsches Reich/Reichsministerium für Volksaufklӓrung und Propaganda, Berlin; stored at Depot Schloss Schӧnhausen, storage of “internationally usable” works of art, from August 1938; [by exchange on March 7, 1940 to Galerie Ferdinand Möller, Cologne]; [sold in1943 to Kunsthändler Ferdinand Mӧller, Berlin, until 1949, registration by Kurt Reutti November 1946]; possibly sold to Baron Philippe Lambert (1930-2011), Brussels]; [sold in 1987 at Christie’s, London, June 29, 1987, Lot 33]; to Nathan (1909-1991) and Marion Smooke (1916-2001), Beverly Hills; Estate of Nathan and Marion Smooke; given in 2003 by their children Richard, Michael, and Barry Smooke to LACMA.
Selected Bibliography: Gordon, Donald E. Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.1968. Catalogue raisonné, no. 554, p. 346, illustrated.

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