Georg Schrimpf
Child Portrait (Peter in Sicily) (Knabenbildnis [Peter in Sizilien])1925

Not on view

Oil painting, full-length portrait of a toddler with exaggerated rounded proportions in a teal romper and white lace bib, standing before vertical bars with a landscape visible beyond

Artist or Maker: Georg Schrimpf
Germany, Munich, 1889-1938
Title: Child Portrait (Peter in Sicily) (Knabenbildnis [Peter in Sizilien])
Date Made: 1925
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 24 1/2 × 17 in. (62.23 × 43.18 cm)
Credit Line: Purchased with funds provided by the Robert Gore Rifkind Foundation, Beverly Hills, CA
Accession Number: M.2013.18
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: Modern Art
Curatorial Notes: A self-taught artist, Georg Schrimpf participated in the seminal Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) exhibition at the Kunsthalle Mannheim in 1925. Among the twelve works he exhibited, four were portraits of children—a genre that captured his imagination throughout his short life. Despite his socialist leanings, Schrimpf is considered part of the more “conservative,” predominantly southern German contingent of New Objectivity artists, due to the many classicizing motifs in his work that evoke the Italian Renaissance. In Child Portrait (Peter in Sicily), the artist portrays his younger son Peter during the family’s Sicilian sojourn in the fall of 1924. The boy’s sandy complexion, his prodigiously adult mannerisms, and the inclusion of a sweeping landscape view as backdrop are informed by Italian Masters from Giotto to Raphael. The muted palette, sharp orthogonals of the cubic Mediterranean architecture, and unsentimental, simplified depiction of background elements also reveal more contemporary Italian influences; having lived in Italy in 1921–1922, Schrimpf would have been familiar with the Pittura Metafisica (Metaphysical Painting) of artists including Giorgio de Chirico and Carlo Carrà. Indeed, the latter would write a short monograph on Schrimpf in 1924 and anoint him “a leading representative of Europe’s new ‘mystical painting."
Provenance: Provenance: Purchase from Christie's London, February 2013. Anonymous sale to the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art, Spanbroek, Christie's London, February 7, 2006, lot 312.
Exhibition History: Stuttgart, Kunstverein, no. 843; (probably) Munich, Deutsches Museum, "Munchener Neue Secession," June-October 1932, no.6 (titled 'Kinderbildnis P.'); (probably) Hanover, kestner-Gesellschaft, "Neue deutsche Romantik," March-April 1933, no.7 (titled 'Kind auf dem Balkon').
Publication: J. Adamiak, "Gerog Schrimpf, Ein Beitrag zum Problem der Malerei der 'Neuen Sachlichkeit'," Berlin, 1961, p.38 (illustrated pl.52); Wolfgang Storch, "Georg Schrimpf und Maria Uhden, Leben und Werk," Berlin, 1985, no.1925/9 (illustrated pp.138 and 219); E. Ansenk (ed.), "Schilders van een andere werkflijkheid: in de collective van het Scheringa Museum voor Realisma, Zwolle, 2006, p.243 (illustrated); P.van der Lugt (ed.), "Nieuw Realisme: 159 werken uit de collective van het voormalige Scheringa Museum voor Realisme," Zwolle, 2010, p.86 (illustrated).
The artist (1889). [Sold at Christie's London, February 7, 2006, lot 312]; to the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art, Spanbroek; [sold at Christie's London]; in 2013 to LACMA.
Selected Bibliography: Barron, Stephanie, and Sabine Eckmann. New Objectivity: Modern German Art in the Weimar Republic, 1919–1933. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art and DelMonico Books/Prestel, 2015.

Storch, Wolfgang, with Karl-Ludwig Hofmann and Christmut Praeger. Georg Schrimpf und Maria Uhden: Leben und Werk. Berlin: Charlottenpresse and Frölich & Kaufmann, 1985.

Georg Schrimpf
Child Portrait (Peter in Sicily) (Knabenbildnis [Peter in Sizilien])1925

Not on view

Artist or Maker: Georg Schrimpf
Germany, Munich, 1889-1938
Title: Child Portrait (Peter in Sicily) (Knabenbildnis [Peter in Sizilien])
Date Made: 1925
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 24 1/2 × 17 in. (62.23 × 43.18 cm)
Credit Line: Purchased with funds provided by the Robert Gore Rifkind Foundation, Beverly Hills, CA
Accession Number: M.2013.18
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: Modern Art
Curatorial Notes: A self-taught artist, Georg Schrimpf participated in the seminal Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) exhibition at the Kunsthalle Mannheim in 1925. Among the twelve works he exhibited, four were portraits of children—a genre that captured his imagination throughout his short life. Despite his socialist leanings, Schrimpf is considered part of the more “conservative,” predominantly southern German contingent of New Objectivity artists, due to the many classicizing motifs in his work that evoke the Italian Renaissance. In Child Portrait (Peter in Sicily), the artist portrays his younger son Peter during the family’s Sicilian sojourn in the fall of 1924. The boy’s sandy complexion, his prodigiously adult mannerisms, and the inclusion of a sweeping landscape view as backdrop are informed by Italian Masters from Giotto to Raphael. The muted palette, sharp orthogonals of the cubic Mediterranean architecture, and unsentimental, simplified depiction of background elements also reveal more contemporary Italian influences; having lived in Italy in 1921–1922, Schrimpf would have been familiar with the Pittura Metafisica (Metaphysical Painting) of artists including Giorgio de Chirico and Carlo Carrà. Indeed, the latter would write a short monograph on Schrimpf in 1924 and anoint him “a leading representative of Europe’s new ‘mystical painting."
Provenance: Provenance: Purchase from Christie's London, February 2013. Anonymous sale to the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art, Spanbroek, Christie's London, February 7, 2006, lot 312.
Exhibition History: Stuttgart, Kunstverein, no. 843; (probably) Munich, Deutsches Museum, "Munchener Neue Secession," June-October 1932, no.6 (titled 'Kinderbildnis P.'); (probably) Hanover, kestner-Gesellschaft, "Neue deutsche Romantik," March-April 1933, no.7 (titled 'Kind auf dem Balkon').
Publication: J. Adamiak, "Gerog Schrimpf, Ein Beitrag zum Problem der Malerei der 'Neuen Sachlichkeit'," Berlin, 1961, p.38 (illustrated pl.52); Wolfgang Storch, "Georg Schrimpf und Maria Uhden, Leben und Werk," Berlin, 1985, no.1925/9 (illustrated pp.138 and 219); E. Ansenk (ed.), "Schilders van een andere werkflijkheid: in de collective van het Scheringa Museum voor Realisma, Zwolle, 2006, p.243 (illustrated); P.van der Lugt (ed.), "Nieuw Realisme: 159 werken uit de collective van het voormalige Scheringa Museum voor Realisme," Zwolle, 2010, p.86 (illustrated).
The artist (1889). [Sold at Christie's London, February 7, 2006, lot 312]; to the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art, Spanbroek; [sold at Christie's London]; in 2013 to LACMA.
Selected Bibliography: Barron, Stephanie, and Sabine Eckmann. New Objectivity: Modern German Art in the Weimar Republic, 1919–1933. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art and DelMonico Books/Prestel, 2015.

Storch, Wolfgang, with Karl-Ludwig Hofmann and Christmut Praeger. Georg Schrimpf und Maria Uhden: Leben und Werk. Berlin: Charlottenpresse and Frölich & Kaufmann, 1985.