Les artistes mit Gemüse (Artists with Vegetable)

Max Beckmann

1943

On View in Gertrude Bernoudy Gallery, Room 4

One of the most influential German modernists, Max Beckmann painted Les artistes mit Gemüse while living in exile in occupied Holland after Leaving Nazi Germany in 1937. In this painting Beckmann depicts himself, in the lower right corner, accompanied by three fellow exiles. Gathered around a small table, each holds a mysterious attribute, including a fish, a vegetable, and what looks like a mask each presumably relating to the figure's identity. Despite the hostilities and turmoil in the external world possibly referenced by the blazing inferno in the picture or window behind the artists the shaman-like figures engage in a sort of spiritual or ritualistic ceremony. Beckmann, in particular during his time in exile, stressed the separation of art from politics, seeing art as an autonomous realm in which the artist's role was to shape spiritual life. Nevertheless a sense of exile and war permeates the painting. [Permanent Collection label, 2019]

Artist Max Beckmann (German, 1884–1950)
Title Les artistes mit Gemüse (Artists with Vegetable)
Date 1943
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions unframed | 58 7/8 x 45 1/4 in.
Credit line University purchase, Kende Sale Fund, 1946
Copyright © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
Object number WU 3789

Technique oil painting
Work type painting
Theme Exile, Migration, and Displacement
Food

Currently on View Gertrude Bernoudy Gallery, Room 4

Artists in Exile: European Surrealists in the US during and after World War II
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 09/01/2023

Max Beckmann: Welttheater (Max Beckmann: The World as a Stage)
Museum Barberini (Potsdam, Germany), 02/24/2018 - 06/10/2018
Kunsthalle Bremen (Bremen, Germany), 09/30/2017 - 02/04/2018

The Modern Meal: Sustenance through Ritual
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 03/31/2017 - 08/06/2017

Dix / Beckmann: Mythos Welt
Dix / Beckmann: Mythos Welt (Dix / Beckmann: World as Myth), Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung (Munich, Germany), 04/11/2014 - 08/10/2014

Face and Figure in European Art, 1928–1945
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 01/25/2013 - 04/21/2013

Max Beckmann: Exile in Amsterdam
Pinakothek der Moderne (Munich, Germany), 09/13/2007 - 01/27/2008

Picasso to Pollock: H.W. Janson and the Legacy of Modern Art at Washington University in St. Louis
Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum (San Antonio, Texas), 08/17/2004 - 10/24/2004

Max Beckmann, un peintre dans l’histoire
Max Beckmann, The Museum of Modern Art, Queens (Long Island City, New York), 06/25/2003 - 09/30/2003
Musée National d’Art Moderne, Centre Pompidou, 09/10/2002 - 01/06/2003
Max Beckmann, Tate Modern (London, England), 02/12/2003 - 05/05/2003

H. W. Janson and the Legacy of Modern Art at Washington University in St. Louis
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 08/30/2002 - 12/08/2002
Salander-O’Reilly Galleries (New York, New York), 03/12/2002 - 04/06/2002

Caught By Politics: Art of the 1930s and 1940s
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 01/19/2001 - 03/18/2001

Affinity of Form: African and Modern European Art
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 08/27/1999 - 10/24/1999

Early Modern European and American Art
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 09/08/1998 - 10/12/1998

Exiles and Emigrés
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 02/23/1997 - 05/11/1997
Neue Nationalgalerie (Berlin, Germany), 10/09/1997 - 01/04/1998
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, 06/19/1997 - 09/07/1997

Max Beckmann: Masterpieces From St. Louis
Staatsgalerie Stuttgart (Stuttgart, Germany), 10/20/1994 - 01/08/1995

A Gallery of Modern Art
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 08/09/1994 - 10/16/1994

Max Beckmann: The Self-Portraits
Gagosian Gallery (New York, New York), 09/15/1992 - 10/31/1992

Max Beckmann Retrospective
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 12/09/1984 - 02/03/1985
Saint Louis Art Museum, 09/07/1984 - 11/04/1984
Nationalgalerie (Berlin, Germany), 05/18/1984 - 07/29/1984
Haus der Kunst, Munich, 02/25/1984 - 04/22/1984

Cubists, Surrealists, and Expressionists
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 05/15/1983 - 09/04/1983

The Art of the Portrait
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 09/20/1982 - 01/09/1982

Westkunst
Museum Ludwig (Cologne, Germany), 05/30/1981 - 08/16/1981

Cubist, Expressionist, and Surrealist Paintings and Sculptures
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 09/20/1980 - 11/02/1980

Centennial Faculty Show
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 11/11/1979 - 01/31/1980

From El Greco to Pollock
Baltimore Museum of Art, 10/22/1968 - 12/08/1968

Washington University Collection of Modern Paintings and Sculpture from Daumier to Pollock
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 04/06/1966 - 05/08/1966

Salute to St. Louis
Stix, Baer & Fuller Department Store (St. Louis, Missouri), 10/04/1965 - 10/16/1965

Opening Exhibition of Mark C. Steinberg Memorial Hall
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 04/29/1960

Paintings and Drawings by Max Beckmann
Saint Louis Art Museum, 06/29/1956 - 07/31/1956

Art at Washington University
Saint Louis Art Museum, 05/07/1953 - 05/31/1953

Max Beckmann, zum Gedächtnis, 1884–1950 [verify]
Schloss Charlottenburg (Berlin, Germany), 08/25/1951 - 09/30/1951
Haus der Kunst, Munich, 06/08/1951 - 08/05/1951
Stedelijk Museum, 12/07/1951 - 01/28/1952

Max Beckmann: A Retrospective Exhibition
Baltimore Museum of Art, 10/31/1948 - 11/24/1948
Minneapolis Institute of Art, 01/13/1949 - 02/16/1949
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 08/03/1948 - 09/05/1948
Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard Art Museums, 12/06/1948 - 12/31/1948
Detroit Institute of Arts, 09/17/1948 - 10/17/1948
Saint Louis Art Museum, 05/10/1948 - 06/21/1948

Max Beckmann, Oils
Philadelphia Art Alliance, 01/28/1947 - 02/23/1947

Beckmann: His Recent Work from 1939 to 1945
Buchholz Gallery (New York, New York), 04/23/1946 - 05/18/1946

Works of Max Beckmann
Drawings and Paintings by Max Beckmann, School of the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston, Massachusetts), 05/19/1946 - 06/18/1946
Paintings by Max Beckmann, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 06/25/1946 - 07/25/1946

Vincent van Gogh [unconfirmed]
Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam, Netherlands), 05/01/1945 - 05/31/1945

H. W. Janson and the Legacy of Modern Art 2002

Spotlights: Collected by the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum 2016

1946
Buchholz Gallery, New York

Inscription [LC:] Beckmann 1943

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