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Lot Essay
In 1910 the Berlin Secession barred certain young artists from exhibiting in the annual exhibition, forcing Tappert and the Brücke painters (Kirchner, Heckel, Pechstein and Schmidt-Rottluff) to found the Neue Sezession in order to show their work. When in the following year this wealth of young artists invited Kandinsky, Marc and the other Blaue Reiter painters to exhibit alongside them, the results were explosive. In this company and in the buoyant atmosphere, Tappert's technique and confidence developed extraordinarily quickly, resulting in a highly personal style, brimming over with vibrant colours and quick, vigorous brushstrokes.
Although Tappert served in the army from 1915 to 1918, his experiences during the war had little effect on his subject matter. While other artists chose to represent the traumas and horrors they had experienced, Tappert continued to explore through his art his fascination with café society and the demi-monde, substituting the grim reality of the war and, in the post-war years, the poverty and rationing that most of Germany was experiencing for this pleasant imaginary world. Visually, however, Tappert's art during the immediate post-war years presents a softer, less brutal atmosphere than his earlier works. Dame mit Hut und schwarzen Handschuhen, painted circa 1921-1923, is an elegant yet sensual depiction of a seated woman, executed in dramatic brushstrokes and with an harmonious use of colour. At first glance, her hat and gloves, which strongly contrast with the beautifully nuanced folds of her dress and the warm tones of the chair and the background, seem to set her in high society. However, as one begins to look more closely at her low cut dress and the impersonality of her hidden face and hidden hands, she appears to belong to the same demi-monde as other, more overtly sexual paintings of this period, such as Sitzende mit Hut und Schleier (circa 1921-1923, private collection) and Sitzende mit Strumpfband (circa 1920-1923, private collection), even depicting the same symbolic black arm band.
Dame mit Hut und schwarzen Handschuhen was exhibited in Tappert's first major retrospective at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin in 1961 and also featured in the pivotal retrospective exhibition organised by Leonard Hutton in New York in 1964.
Although Tappert served in the army from 1915 to 1918, his experiences during the war had little effect on his subject matter. While other artists chose to represent the traumas and horrors they had experienced, Tappert continued to explore through his art his fascination with café society and the demi-monde, substituting the grim reality of the war and, in the post-war years, the poverty and rationing that most of Germany was experiencing for this pleasant imaginary world. Visually, however, Tappert's art during the immediate post-war years presents a softer, less brutal atmosphere than his earlier works. Dame mit Hut und schwarzen Handschuhen, painted circa 1921-1923, is an elegant yet sensual depiction of a seated woman, executed in dramatic brushstrokes and with an harmonious use of colour. At first glance, her hat and gloves, which strongly contrast with the beautifully nuanced folds of her dress and the warm tones of the chair and the background, seem to set her in high society. However, as one begins to look more closely at her low cut dress and the impersonality of her hidden face and hidden hands, she appears to belong to the same demi-monde as other, more overtly sexual paintings of this period, such as Sitzende mit Hut und Schleier (circa 1921-1923, private collection) and Sitzende mit Strumpfband (circa 1920-1923, private collection), even depicting the same symbolic black arm band.
Dame mit Hut und schwarzen Handschuhen was exhibited in Tappert's first major retrospective at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin in 1961 and also featured in the pivotal retrospective exhibition organised by Leonard Hutton in New York in 1964.