Landscape with Balloon
Max Beckmann (1884-1950), Landscape with Balloon (Landschaft mit Ballon), drypoint, 1918, signed in pencil lower right. Reference: Hofmaier 134, second state (of 2), from the total edition of 100, printed on cream laid paper. From the portfolio Gesichter (Faces) published by the Marees Gesellschaft, with their watermark lower right. In excellent condition, the full sheet with deckle edges, 9 1/4 x 11 1/2, the sheet 11 3/4 x 14 1/2 inches, archival matting.
A fine fresh impression, printed in black ink on cream laid paper.
The Gesichter portfolio was a collection of mostly unrelated prints which Beckmann made over the course of WWI, from 1914 to 1918, published in 1919.
The composition was basically complete in the first state; in the second state Beckmann added the flagpoles in the windows, and the sun (or moon) in the sky.
This scene is of the Darmstadter Landstrasse in the suburbs of Frankfort. Balloons were not infrequently seen at this time, and were of special significance to Beckmann; one appeared in a painting he made in 1908, and in a painting in reverse of this composition (now in the Museum Ludwig, Cologne) dated 1917.