Lot 12 Dα

The magnificent portfolio work “Van Zantens glückliche Zeit” occupies a singular place within Otto Lange’s oeuvre. As a special edition on Japan paper with all of the colour woodcuts, individually designed portfolio and the accompanying foreword, this work is extremely rare.
Our copy’s provenance leads through the important figure of Dr Hans F. Secker (1888-1960). This art historian was head of the Städtische Galerie and the Westpreußisches Provinzialmuseum in Gdańsk from 1912 to 1922 and was then director of the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum in Cologne until 1928. He set new standards as a committed champion of modern art. Secker was additionally the author of the portfolio’s foreword.
“Van Zantens glückliche Zeit” was written by the Danish author Laurids Bruun in 1908, and the first German translation appeared in 1911. This story set in the South Pacific clearly struck a chord with many modern artists, who were fascinated by this exotic island world seemingly untouched by modern civilisation. Not just Otto Lange but also Hermann Max Pechstein, Otto Mueller and Georg Schrimpf also created woodcuts and lithographs illustrating Bruun’s novel.
Lange’s hand-printed impressions are distinguished by their distinctive artistic quality and the rich fantasy of his treatment of the story. Their painterly character, with its fine nuances of colour, was obtained by applying the colours with a brush instead of a roller. In bold, expressive lines and luminous colours, the artist celebrates the natural beauty and archaically pristine quality of his fictional South-Sea paradise.