LEFLER (Heinrich):
Die Nachtigall [The Emperor’s Nightingale]. 原作
(Design for the Märchen Kelender of Hans Christian Andersen). Vienna, ca.1910.
ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR drawing illustrating a poignant scene from one of Andersen’s most famous series of Fairy Tales, rendered as a calendar by Lefler in collaboration with his brother-in-law Joseph Urban.
Measures 7 x 9 3/16 inches, mounted on thin card, matted and framed.
Heinrich Lefler (1863-1919) worked primarily in Vienna as a member of the Künstlerhaus (1891) and by late 1890s he became one of Austria’s first artists to design posters, then an emerging and highly popular medium. Together with Urban, he designed costumes, interiors, furniture and accessories. In 1900 they co-founded the Hagenbund, an artists’ cooperative that exhibited works by a number of important figures including Oskar Kokoschka and Egon Schiele. From 1903-1910 Lefler taught at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Vienna. This image is considered amongst the most beautiful designs in his oeuvre.