Heckendorf, Franz (Berlin 1888 – Munich 1965). A Lion’s Assault on a Wild Boar in the Oasis. The latter itself paradisiacally dreamily under bright sun. Oil on fiberboard. 55 x 69.8 cm. In 3-piece-wooden frame – presumably by the artist himself – painted grey and black.

Literature

Kestner-Museum Hannover, (Catalogues of the Special Exhibitions) XVII, 1918; Joachim Kirchner, Franz Heckendorf, 1919 + 1924; Franz Heckendorf, catalogue of the special exhibition of the Galerie Hagemeier, Frankfort/M.) 1985; Thieme-Becker XVI, 211 f.; Vollmer II, 400; Cicerone, vols. 1912-1928; Feuer II, 1 (1920/21), 195-202. – Comp. Robels, Frans Snyders, Munich 1989, no. 258 with illustrations + Koslow, Frans Snyders, Antwerp 1995, (colour) illustrations, pp. 292 + 305.

Small defect at the upper right corner, nearby another one of the kind of a big needle’s head. The edges slightly worn by the framing, otherwise perfect. – The colouring of the artist’s frame touched up.

containing everything, reflecting everything that from the earliest up to the latest literature was qualified just as breathless as the range of Heckendorf’s palette. The prevailing ground of his paintings allowing to our review the following chronological order: Canvas for the early years of about 1912-1929, (ply-)wood 1930-1943, fiberboard already for 1941, more generally then for the fifties, just that

“ period in Heckendorf’s work in which the artist once again scored a height of his artistry, presumably also as a backlog demand after the vacuum of the Hitler regime … ”

(Horst Ludwig in the catalogue of the Galerie Hagemeier).

Picking up again one of his important themes grown during his years in Paris, Italy, Dalmatia, Asia Minor for studies, and his missions as fighter pilot at the Ostfront,

the  Balkans , Bosporus  and  Tigris

in World War I. “The most mature H. has done till now are his landscapes” (Th.-B. 1923, quoting at the same time under the aspect of “Outspokenly gifted for decorative arts” a  lion’s  hunt  as  an  example  for  his  monumental  paintings).

Ludwig’s stressing of the “wide-spreaded journeys through Europe and (the) study of Old Masters in the museums” especially for the latter of paramount interest here of greatest evidence, unmistakably, but newly embedded quite uniquely by the purpose to

“ ‘spiritualize everything that is optically visible and translate it into the sphere of the visionarily seen’; that meant

the  accomplishment  of  the  program  of  modern  expressionism ,

of  which  H.  is  one  of  the  most  persuasive  evangelists … ”

(Vollmer in Thieme-Becker).

Shadow-play found as incorrectly as, e.g. that of the palms in front left, coincided not only with this, but also in sense of Goethe in respect of contrary shading at Rubens :

“ That it’s by which Rubens is found great … that he stands with free genious  over  nature treating it to his own higher intents … (by) that art is subjected to the natural requirement not at all, but having its own law ”

(Conversations with Eckermann, Bln. 1955, pp. 318 f.).

The same brought on the point in short by Stephan Kemperdick on occasion of a church interior by Dirk van Delen: “… the lighting is like the perspective artifice, not life-like construction” (Catalogue Speck von Sternburg, ed. by Herwig Guratzsch, 1998, p. 150).

And referring to Willem Kalf (Rotterdam 1619 – Amsterdam 1693) Goethe again :

“ The mastership of this man in this field of art (the still lifes, here of the Paris period, 1640/45, as far as dated from 1643/44) shows here in its supreme light. One has to see this picture (Grisebach no. 64, ills. 63) to realize in which sense the art is superior to nature and what the human mind imparts on the things when he observes them with a creative eye. At least with me it’s no question that, if I had to choose the golden bowls or the picture,

I  would  choose  the  picture ”

(Goethe Golden and Silver Bowls by Kalff in his notes For the Recollection of Städel’s Cabinet of Aug. 19, 1797, quoted from Grisebach, 1974, p. 84).

And to Vollmer again :

“ Pupil of the instruction class of the Berlin Museum of the Applied Arts and the Acad., but essentially autodidact (as the contemporaries Heckel + E. L. Kirchner, too, and like these starting from impressionism). One of the most skilled exponents of the young generation of German artists, whose personal style found its most mature expression till now in his landscapes filled

by  an  enormous  dynamic  of  pictorial  execution

and carried by a strong inwardness of perception. Already as a 20-year-old he exhibited (1909) 2 Street Scenes in the Berlin Secession which were still influenced by the impression of the impressionist way to paint …

Making a hard but very expressive contour to the basis of his compositions, he creates a

a  vehemently  raised  natural  impression

by an erratically abrupt juxtaposition of his glowing, often brutally rich local colours that part themselves as consciously from any realistic depiction as the flow of his lines. The suggestion of movement that radiates from his landscapes

over  which  it  flickers  like  summer-lightning

results  from  the  roaring  force  of  their  pictorial  factur ,

in which far less an outer excited mood of the respective natural situation than the inner excitement of the creating artist is expressed, thus these landscape visions transport a quite subjective character … . ”

All this then unspent fresh. And as a downright antipole to the earthly hunt here, too, the unforgettable sun, Heckendorf’s sun, to which in 1919 he dedicated an album of 10 colour lithographs. Which was preceded two years earlier by a not less colour-intensive 12-sheet set dedicated to the Orient, his Orient.

It is of really exciting fascination how this work spans from the early to the late years without a break. On this Ludwig in view of a work documenting half a century:

“ Even more distinct this tendency of the excessive nature becomes in the paintings, e.g. ‘Southern Landscape with Sailing Boats’ of 1958. Here also the claim to describe purely and barely what urged the artist to his work as already raised in the program of the ‘Bridge Artists’ in 1906 becomes recognizable: the own vision that first linked itself to the landscape though not following it purely imitatively.

“ With passionate brushstrokes that remain visible as such and are used artistically, with pasty colour application so that a vivid surface of the painting appears the southern painting is visualized … Smooth transitions are neither in the forms nor in the colours …

“ Even the sky … with the glorious sun is structured quite powerful. Beams and concentric circles radiate from this celestial body and thus set the firmament into a pulsating vibration that suggests the power of the light very beautifully.

“ The colours themselves are put harshly against each other, too, nearly in pure tones they are applied with a relatively broad brush and stay connected to the brush’s trace so that the composition is clearly put together from these layers of lines. By this a dynamic small structure develops which adds to the enlivement of the whole picture. ”

And quoting Joachim Kirchner on the line

“ ‘The line as the nerve of the composition, as the very own writing of the will carried by a powerful spirituality might be rated as the most singular of Heckendorf’s expressionism. As brutal and harsh the language of his lineation often seems to be, so always it is full of soul, its strong impulse reveals the inner tension, the restrained excitement by which the artist works at the intellectual penetration of the object. As sustainer of the whole rhythm of the picture it finally gets an important function in the structure of the complete image.’

“ Overlooking Heckendorf’s creation from several decades the vehemence by which he developed his own pictorial language, emanating from the art of the turn of the century and still kept in the 50s, is astonishing … For Heckendorf the object always remained priority though formally heightened and coloristically alienated. ”

And, so Thieme-Becker, “In all techniques a master and a talent producing extraordinarily easily”.

as an exceptionally exemplary example of this great creativeness. As thematically not found on the market, thus missing in the comprehensive exhibition of 1985, too.

But recoursing to no one less than the great Snyders who on his part refers to Rubens. And here to Snyders’ – concerning the landscape jointly with Jan Wildens – oil

“ Lioness  striking  a  Wild  Boar ”  of  c.  1620/25  in  Munich .

That along with his “Two Young Lions pursuing a Roebuck” also there (Robels 258 f.; see Piloty’s toned lithograph of 1816)

“ hold a special rank because of their theme … (the first) assumes an invention by Rubens. For in her movement (the Lioness) is similar to the attacking tiger on a hunting painting in Rennes and a lion on a variant in Dresden that themselves (– Because ‘As with the princely dynasties and noble families

whole  genealogical  trees  of  influences

can  be  drawn  for  painters’ ,

so Gina Thomas in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of Feb. 20, 2001; suitable to literature see Goethe, op. cit., pp. 160 f. –) go back to an ancient copy.

For “The sujet of the animal fight exists since classical antiquity, in prints since the 16^th century” (Stefan Morét in Ridinger Catalog Darmstadt, 1999, p.91, reminding together of the famous marble group of a horse clawed by a lion on the Capitol at Rome). During his stays there (1601/02 + late in 1606) Rubens now shall have seen as well the marble group as have become acquainted with the relevant famous works by Giambologna (Giovanni Bologna, Douai 1529 – Florence 1608). For the latter Thieme-Becker mention among the remarkable small sculptures also the one of the horse clawed by the lion (“an unusual variation on the theme”, cat. Prague, see below) and the bull killed by the tiger resp., for which, refrained from besides repetitions and numerous copies, Bologna widely delivered only the sketches. As towards the end of the 16^th century the lions of Antiquity enjoyed particular favour in the Medici collection in Rome, for which in 1594 Flaminio Vaccra made a companion piece to the lion statuette by Bologna (see Cat. Rudolf II and Prague, 1997, p. 521, II/243 + for the bronze version of the horse with the lion worked about 1600 by Antonio Susin[i] as presumably commissioned work p. 520, II/236, both with ills.).

The theme evidently lay in the air again. The interesting at this, and therefore shown here, is the school overlapping revival as an applause for the

“ Magic  of  the  Beasts ”

(Justus Müller-Hofstede in his review of the 1985 Cologne/Utrecht Savery exhibition [FAZ Nov. 10, 1985] with illustration of the 1628 oil of the lion striking a cow), to which then centuries later also Heckendorf paid tribute to, understood over the times like a parabel for the order of the world.

Robels sees for Snyders only a nexus with the fable tradition, reminding of Äsop’s fable after which the end of a fight between a lion and a boar is awaited by a vulture (see the illustration in Robels, page 350) … The missing of the vulture in Snyders (as in Heckendorf) not reveals the intention of a tale’s illustration though. But the origin of this

unusual  motif  of  a  fight  between  lion  and  boar

should not be questioned … Thus in a broader sense the picture might insinuate to the blindness of two pugnacious fighters … (Revealing altogether Snyders’) secret sense for

the  tragic  beauty  of  the  fight , an  affirmation  of  natural  law ”

(Hella Robels, op. cit., pp. 92 f. + 42, but see also p. 40).

The latter then also quite in the sense of Ortega y Gasset

(Meditations on the Hunt, Stuttgart 1981).

Whereby Heckendorf added the exotic landscape to Snyders’ exotic hunt which allowed him

the  highest  possible  intensification  of  his  work

and reincarnated the great predecessor as the “most important still life and animal painter of Flemish art, maybe even of his epoch” (Catalogue Berlin/Dahlem 1975, p. 405) with the central motif

Paw-like pastily as once already Philipp Peter Roos (Rosa da Tivoli, 1657-1706) was able to fascinate the connoisseurs with his less wild companions, the goats, sheep and neats of the Roman Campagna, till today.
Offer no. 28,420  /  price on request

„ das ‚Haupt-Schwein‘ ist gut … angekommen und gefällt … falls sich weitere Funde … auftun, freue ich mich über Ihre Nachricht “

(Herr W. S., 29. August 2002)