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Remarkable artist, studied at the Bauhaus under Oscar Schlemmer and Lyonel Feininger. His works are most influenced from his first trips to Italy (1921-24), where he discovered the landscape as motif, and in France (1927-28), here by the cubism, Pablo Picasso and Marc Chagall. He belongs to the so-called "verschollenen Generation" (Forgotten Generation), which describes a generation of young German artists born between 1890 and 1905. Artists who didn't have the possibility of continuous working and neither to exhibit consistently, because their lifes and creation was influenced by the difficult circumstances of two World Wars. Mainly of the Nazi Regime, they became victims of the denunciation of '“Degenerate Art“. Their early work was often destroyed or torn apart and so they fall into oblivion. Until several newer publications and exhibitions, which reminded on their first successes, drawn a wide attention from museums and privat collectors to them. Recently many artists of this generation been revalued and continue to climb in value. They are also called „Expressive Realists“.
Literature: Alfred Hentzen - Werner Gilles, Cologne 1960; M. Schwengers - Werner Gilles, stylistic and iconographical studies of his work, Cologne 1985. Further reading: Rainer Zimmermann, Die Kunst der verschollenen Generation, Munich 1994.
His works are represented in important public and private collections including: Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen zu Berlin Preußischer Kulturbesitz; Kunsthalle Bremen; Sprengel Museum Hannover; Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe; Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen Munich; Von der Heydt-Museum Wuppertal; Staatliche Graphische Sammlung München; Hamburger Kunsthalle / Graphisches Kabinett, Rheinisches Landesmuseum Bonn; Städtisches Museum Mülheim/Ruhr; Wallraf- Richartz-Museum Cologne; Städtisches Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach; Graphische Sammlung der Staatsgalerie Stuttgart; Westfälisches Landesmuseum Münster
Notes: ... and he (Gilles) began with ink drawing, for days and often for weeks. In Palinuro he found the models among the local population. The young fishermen, in which he recognized the Greek origin and the purity of the contours. He catched them on the paper, first singly, then in compositions with arcadian style by two, three and four. (see Hentzen, p. 102, with the fig. of the drawings 55-58)
... All these drawings are related to the classical ideal of the body, are studies of posture and gesture, spontaneous impressions with the enthusiasm for the beauty of simple movements and poses... (see Schwengers, p. 74-75, fig.-no. 77).
Excellent sketch from his series of drawings from young fishermens in Palinuro, Italy between 1939 and 1941. Fine original condition.
Further details and price on request.
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