As the oldest art fair in the world, ART COLOGNE will once again be the most important industry meeting place in Germany from 17 to 20 November. Thole Rotermund Kunsthandel presents a top-class range of works by August Macke, Max Beckmann, Paul Klee, Franz Marc, Hermann Max Pechstein, Alexej von Jawlensky, Lyonel Feininger and others, true to our motto: classic, modern, paper!

Of particular note is August Macke's drawing "Frau vor Hutladen" (Woman in front of a hat shop), 1913, whose equivalent, painted in oil, is part of the permanent collection of the Lenbachhaus in Munich. We are honouring this wonderful work from Macke's time in Switzerland with its own publication, which, among other things, reveals the remarkable provenance history. Another highlight is the surprisingly cheerful and colourful watercolour by Max Beckmann from 1949, while Hermann Max Pechstein's drawings from 1937 show the great "Brücke" artist's retreat into nature. The strong character of Franz Radziwill's "Street Scene with Red Balloons" impressively documents his initial, expressionist style phase and outstanding painting skills.

Around 1916, Paul Klee began to mount selected works on paper on cardboard and to apply the so-called margin line, a horizontal line below the title. Only then did they become definitive, new works. In the case of our "Two Small Watercolours", the result even receives the highest distinction from the artist: "Special Class" - marked by his own hand on the backing cardboard with "S Kl". "Art does not reproduce the visible; rather, it makes it visible" - following his own credo, Paul Klee creates imaginary space at an imaginary time, with imaginary movement, in his 1921 ink drawing "Heimgartenanlage". And he declares: "Art relates to creation in a parable-like manner."

Hall 11.1 / Stand C410

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

will take place in Hamburg for the second time at the end of September.

From 29 September to 2 October 2022, the works of over 30 international artists will be exhibited at paper positions hamburg in the centrally located Jupiter, the former Karstadt Sport, on Mönckebergstraße. Selected Hamburg galleries and a small selection of exhibitors from other parts of Germany will each present an artistic position of contemporary and modern art with, from and on paper.

The principle of colour
Eduard Bargheer and Rolf Hans in dialogue

If he had to name a colour theory, Paul Klee wrote in 1922, it would have to be Phillipp Otto Runge's "Colour Sphere" of 1809, for this was and would remain the only one that dealt with colour in a way that "seems to be closest to us painters". It allows the painter to be free and opens up all possibilities. For Runge, the language of the picture is not determined by nature, but as something shaped is completely unbound by its scientifically assumed reality. Thus, Runge's theory of colour is a view of how one communicates with colour in a picture, not as a symbolic or allegorical but as a direct, sensual language. 

In our presentation for this year's paper positions Hamburg, we juxtapose two artists who, each in their very individual approach to colour, open up a surprising field of tension and illustrate the freedom of painting:

Rolf Hans (1938 - 1996).

Inspired by the colour field painting of the 'abstract expressionists', colour is the sole vehicle of expression for Rolf Hans. Mood and feeling are conveyed solely through the emotional power of the colouring, which in its elementary effect allows the viewer to experience "nature like religion".

Hans has been drawn to Ticino time and again since 1967; the seclusion and unique beauty of the landscape inspire him anew each time he visits. He works here, "in nature by head." For Rolf Hans, this does not mean a lifelike reproduction of what he sees, but rather to convey the regularity of creation pictorially with his own instruments. In his works, Rolf Hans uses the "language of colours" to reveal inexhaustible variations on the sensation of the infinity of nature, which moves man in the depths of his existence. At the same time, he is aware that the nature of nature is quite different from the nature of his works. For while the latter possesses scales that are designed for variety and duration, his depictions are transcripts of momentary impressions and thus represent sections of this whole. All the more he strives to find a universally valid statement. In this, Hans follows the landscape painting of the 19th century. Like Philip Otto Runge, he uses nature as a model "to depict the mathematics of the organic as the logic of its statement. Hans does this impressively with extremely minimal painterly means. He finds his statement solely through the colourfulness that shines from within and the "communication" of the tones with each other. 

Eduard Bargheer (1901 - 1979)

Eduard Bargheer's art is one of the most astonishing and exciting achievements of modernism. The principle of his work is transfiguration, the sign-like representation of reality - he works as if triggered by the visible world. All of Bargheer's paintings are based on an abstracting process that creates an exciting relationship between form and colour. The coloured surface forms its own space in the overall composition and often does not coincide at all with the preliminary drawing and the linear structure of the picture. Under the impression of the Mediterranean abundance of light - which he experiences in his adopted home, the island of Ischia - the colour additionally serves to express the harmony of colour and light that Bargheer strives for. The lightness of the watercolours are the ideal means for him to achieve this: "I always called the watercolour by its first name, and I always called the oil painting by its first name," is how the artist describes his relationship.
Again and again, Bargheer wrestles impressive metaphors of high intensity from nature. What seems to come so easily today is in fact hard-won - both artistically and socially: elementary visions in the confrontation with the surface in which ever new ideas of colour are found. In this way, he comes ever closer to the compositions of his admired friend Paul Klee, who also saw the complicated in the simple.