Along with Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc, Alexej von Jawlensky cofounded Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider), a Munich-based group known for an interest in the spiritual dimension of art. Painted in luminous colors with haunting dark eyes, the figure in The Young Christ conveys a powerful sense of emptiness and solitude. The painting is one of a series known as Variations, in which Jawlensky focused on the human face as the bearer of emotion.
In the 1930s Galka Scheyer, a German émigré collector and art dealer, settled in Los Angeles and promoted Jawlensky, Lyonel Feininger, Kandinsky, and Paul Klee. Through her efforts many local collectors acquired works by Jawlensky, including Samuel and Harriet Freeman, whose Hollywood Hills home was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. This painting, with its original frame by architect Rudolph Schindler, remained in their house until they donated it to LACMA in 1979.
Wall label, 2021.
