Drawing for 'The Mirror of the Bourgeoisie' (circa 1925)

George Grosz

ink on paper

Tate, London, Liverpool and St Ives

Drawing for 'The Mirror of the Bourgeoisie' (circa 1925)

Classification:

Drawing and Watercolour

Materials:

Ink, Paper

Physical Object Description:

Inscribed 'Grosz' bottom right

Dimensions:

62.9 x 50.5 (support) cm

Accession Number:

T00020

Credit:

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 1955

Scheme:

Gift

Ownership history:

Purchased from the artist by Alfred Flechtheim (1878-1937), Berlin and London; by whom given to the Contemporary Art Society, 1936; on loan to Charles Robert Chisman (1874-1955) of Art Exhibitions Bureau, 1938; presented to the Tate Gallery, 1955

Relationship:

Charles Robert Chisman Art Exhibitions Bureau, London Tate, London, Liverpool and St Ives Alfred Flechtheim

Subject:

Couple, Man and Wife, People, Expressionism, New-Objectivity, Newspaper, Satire

This ‘Drawing for “The Mirror of the Bourgeoisie”- Illustration for “Der Spiesser-Spiegel” (The Street; 9 figures)’, 1925 was purchased from the artist by the avant-garde German Jewish art dealer Alfred Flechtheim (1878-1937) who gifted it, along with two other works on paper by the artist, to the Contemporary Art Society in 1936. Flechtheim had been representing Grosz from 1923 but by 1933 he had been persecuted by the Nazis and had his Düsseldorf gallery confiscated. Penniless, Flechtheim fled to Paris and then to London where he worked anonymously for the Mayor Gallery and organised exhibits of the artworks of exiled German artists. All three of Grosz's works were on loan to Charles Robert Chisman (1874-1955) of the Art Exhibitions Bureau from 1938 and this drawing and the watercolour, or coloured drawing, of The Married Couple (Ehepaar), 1930 for a portfolio entitled "Natural History of the German Middle Class" that the artist had been working on before his own emigration to the USA in 1933, were presented to the Tate Gallery in 1955.

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