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On light laid paper. One of 17 impressions by the artist known to date. Signed and dated lower right and inscribed ‘(4)’. 54 x 19 on 58 x 35 cm.
Four color copies of this woodcut, made from a black drawing block and colored plate in yellow ochre, are known to date.
Other copies are in the following collections: Brücke Museum, Berlin; Kupferstichkabinett Dresden; Franz Marc Museum, Kochel; National Gallery, Washington;
Note: By printing the yellow contour line in a monotype style, Heckel achieved the effect of hand coloring.
Erich Heckel’s sculptural principle, according to which “there is a figure in every trunk,” also seems to have applied to his woodcuts. He also inserts a figure into a board sawn from an irregular trunk, here the wonderfully sensual nude of his Siddi, a Dresden dancer whom he later married. The figure completely fills the surface, the pictorial space, and yet is full of movement. She is dancing.
This woodcut is equivalent to Kirchner’s “Nude with Black Hat” from 1911/12, a similarly portrait-format nude of his Dresden partner Dodo.
