Lot 41 D

With its extravagantly shaped, asymmetrical calyx, the arum lily is one of the most elegant flowers immortalised by Emil Nolde in his famous still lifes. He usually combined them with other types of blooms featuring contrasting colours, but here the exotic beauties are presented by themselves and fill the entire picture.
The leaves and slender stems rise up in front of a softly toned background in a complex network of lines and shapes crowned by two luminously yellow blooms. By using different shades of green and a metallic light blue, Nolde has masterfully succeeded in depicting the character of the stiff, dark leaves, whose smooth surfaces brightly reflect the light falling on them. In spite of this proximity to the plants’ natural appearance, the painter has abstracted their forms into delicate fields of colour that stand out clearly and luminously against the soft, silvery grey behind them.