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Lot Essay
‘I can see from the work I am doing now, that in my old age I will be able to go on developing Merz. After my death it will be possible to distinguish 4 periods in my Merz works: the Sturm and Drang of the first works – in a sense revolutionary in the art world – then the dry, more scientific search for the new possibilities and the laws of the composition and materials, then the brilliant game with skills gained, that is to say, the present stage, and ultimately the utilization of acquired strengths in the intensification of expression. I will have achieved that in around ten years.’ (Kurt Schwitters, ‘Letter to Helma Schwitters’, 23 December 1939’, quoted in Schwitters in Britain exh. cat., London, 2013, p. 56).
Untitled (Ternationa) is a Merz-collage from Schwitters’ last years living as an exile in England. Executed in 1942, it belongs to a briefly joyous period for the artist when, recently liberated from an internment camp on the Isle of Man, Schwitters was living in London and attempting to re-establish himself amidst the avant-garde of the metropolis.
A letter to his wife Helma, written shortly before he fled Norway with his son Ernst in the wake of the Nazi invasion of the country in 1940, reveals that Schwitters considered his work of this period to be amongst his most accomplished, being what he called ‘a brilliant game with skills gained’. Untitled (Ternationa) was probably executed at the beginning of 1942 while Schwitters was living in Paddington. Elements of English daily life such as a Paddington laundry ticket and a label for raspberry jam are here dominated by colourful cuttings of an American magazine advert for the D-400 truck and another for the Chrysler Corporation.
As if by way of a seal or signature for this American or ‘international’ theme of the work, which incidentally also includes the handwritten word ‘England’, Schwitters, who was a habitual noticer of dates, anniversaries and numerical coincidences, has included a post-mark from a letter sent to him from Flushing, New York. This probably came from his old friend and former neighbour in Hannover Käte Steinitz, who had moved to New York in the ‘1930s and regularly corresponded with Schwitters. Anticipating the international advent of ‘Pop’ art, upon which his own example was to have such an influence, particularly in Britain, Untitled (Ternationa) can be considered a rare and auspicious, transatlantic Merzbild.
Untitled (Ternationa) is a Merz-collage from Schwitters’ last years living as an exile in England. Executed in 1942, it belongs to a briefly joyous period for the artist when, recently liberated from an internment camp on the Isle of Man, Schwitters was living in London and attempting to re-establish himself amidst the avant-garde of the metropolis.
A letter to his wife Helma, written shortly before he fled Norway with his son Ernst in the wake of the Nazi invasion of the country in 1940, reveals that Schwitters considered his work of this period to be amongst his most accomplished, being what he called ‘a brilliant game with skills gained’. Untitled (Ternationa) was probably executed at the beginning of 1942 while Schwitters was living in Paddington. Elements of English daily life such as a Paddington laundry ticket and a label for raspberry jam are here dominated by colourful cuttings of an American magazine advert for the D-400 truck and another for the Chrysler Corporation.
As if by way of a seal or signature for this American or ‘international’ theme of the work, which incidentally also includes the handwritten word ‘England’, Schwitters, who was a habitual noticer of dates, anniversaries and numerical coincidences, has included a post-mark from a letter sent to him from Flushing, New York. This probably came from his old friend and former neighbour in Hannover Käte Steinitz, who had moved to New York in the ‘1930s and regularly corresponded with Schwitters. Anticipating the international advent of ‘Pop’ art, upon which his own example was to have such an influence, particularly in Britain, Untitled (Ternationa) can be considered a rare and auspicious, transatlantic Merzbild.