Lesser Ury (German, 1861-1931)
Schloss Reinhartshausen, 1924
Pastel on board
13-5/8 x 19-5/8 inches (34.5 x 49.8 cm)
Signed lower left: L. Ury
On the reverse: artist's estate label numbered 357; white label stamped LESSER URY / 229; handwritten title: Schloss Reinhartshausen

PROVENANCE:
Estate of the artist;
Galerie Paul Cassirer, Berlin, Auction 21.10.1932, lot 229 (as Parkwiese Schloss Reichartshausen);
Eugen Weissner, Berlin, 1932;
Rita and Michael Zychlinski (Aroth), Berlin, circa 1945-51;
By descent to the present owner, Venice, California.

EXHIBITED:
Berlin, "Neue Kunsthandlung," 1924.

LITERATURE:
A. Donath, "Aus der Museumswelt, Lesser in der Nationalgalerie," Der Kunstwanderer, December 1924, p.117, ill. p.114 (as Schloss Reichardtshausen);
R. Landau, Der Unbestechliche Minos, Kritik an der Zeitkunst, Hamburg 1925, ill. between p. 52 and p.53 (as Landschaft am Rhein).

During the summer of 1924, German artist Lesser Ury visited the Middle Rhine Valley, with its castles, ruins and picturesque landscapes. The results of his highly productive summer "study tour" earned him an exhibition from the Berlin National Gallery in the Kronprinzenpalais. The critical reception was enthusiastic: "The proud, bursting landscape, which is our delight and our charge, with its whole orchestra of its forms and colors, has revived the painter's reputation."

While the large Ury exhibition was on view in the Kronprinzenpalais, the Neue Kunsthandlung in Berlin's Tauentzienstrasse mounted a parallel exhibition devoted exclusively to Ury's pastels, most of which were also made on his journey to the Rhine. Among them was the present work. One writer noted, "A pure pastel exhibition by Lesser Ury has its own special meaning, [since] none of the German Impressionists used the pastel technique continuously from their youth to such a great extent as Ury... he is their modern reformer..."

Over the course of the summer of 1924, Ury's sojourn yielded a series of landscapes featuring smaller localities (Hattenheim) or prominent buildings (Burg Rheinstein). Schloss Reichartshausen, the subject of the present work, once belonged to the Cistercian monastery of Eberbach, and from the 12th century until the beginning of the 19th century was an important adjunct complex to the monastery.

The provenance of this vivid Rhineland pastel can be traced back to the artist's estate. The inventory of the estate of Lesser Ury, created on November 21, 1931 by Dr. Karl Schwarz, then head of the art collections of the Jewish community in Berlin, listed this pastel as number 357, and described it as "Schloss in the park." When it was auctioned as part of Ury's estate on October 21, 1932 at the Galerie Paul Cassirer in Berlin, it was purchased by Eugen Weissner, an antique dealer and auction commissioner from Berlin. Weissner and his wife Hertha fled Germany for Holland under the Nazi regime but were deported. Weissner died in Auschwitz and his wife in Sobibor. The pastel apparently remained in Berlin, where between 1945 and 1951 it was acquired by Rita and Michael Zychlinski (Aroth) before they emigrated to the United States.

We are grateful to Dr. Sibylle Gro? for endorsing the authorship of this pastel to Lesser Ury on the basis of photographs, and for providing the research and expertise that forms the basis for this catalogue essay. The lot is accompanied by her certificate of authenticity dated October 8, 2016.

Alternate Artist Spellings: "Lesser Ury", "Lesser-Ury", "Uri, Lesser", "Ury, Lesser"

The pastel has not been fixed and has some smudges and rubbing throughout; otherwise, there do not appear to be any major condition issues visible. Framed under glass. Framed Dimensions 23 X 28.5 X 3 Inches