Rudolf Nehmer (1912-1983), The Fruitless Tree, 1948

Rudolf Nehmer (1912 Bobersberg - 1983 Dresden), The fruitless tree, 1948. Woodcut on yellowish wove paper, 15 cm x 14.6 cm (image), 45 cm x 30 cm (sheet size), signed “Rud.[olf] Nehmer” in pencil lower right and inscribed “Matth. 7,19” lower left.

- The wide sheet margin somewhat bumped and slightly wavy in places, the image in excellent, colorful condition.

- The End of the Grotesque Era -

This woodcut is part of Nehmer's best-known series, his pictorial interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount (Matth. 5:1-7:29), created shortly after the end of World War II. The print illustrates the verse: Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Matth. 7:19).

The overgrown, gnarled old tree has become dilapidated, while the young tree opposite, which is just growing toward heaven, is bearing fruit. The old tree looks like a grimace: the two stumps are the eyes, the broken piece underneath is the mouth, and the branches are the hands raised to heaven in lament. The tree also represents the recent past, which has brought death and ruin and has perished, just as the tree will now perish.

About the artist

Rudolf Nehmer studied from 1932 to 1934 in Dresden at the private art academy founded by Ernst Oskar Simonson-Castelli under Woldemar Winkler and, after a brief interlude at the art academy, was a student in Willy Kriegel's studio until 1936. After his first one-man show in 1935 at the Kühl Art Exhibition in Dresden, which was progressive until the Nazi era, Nehmer was represented at the major German art exhibitions in the following years. In 1938 he stayed in Worpswede. From 1941 he was a soldier on the Western Front and in Denmark, returning to Dresden from British captivity in 1945. After the war, he had his first solo exhibition in 1945. Nehmer was a co-founder of the artists' association 'Das Ufer - Gruppe 1947' and in 1951 a founding member of the artists' cooperative 'Kunst und Zeit'. He had numerous solo and group exhibitions in the GDR, culminating in a retrospective at the Galerie Neuer Meister on the occasion of his 60th birthday.