Ernst Barlach: Wall object 'Head of the Güstrow Memorial of Honour', reduction in bronze, sculpture

Memorial and expression of friendship: The 'Hovering Man' One of Ernst Barlach's most famous works, the 'Hovering Man', was created as a memorial to the victims of the First World War and hung as such in a niche in Güstrow Cathedral from 1927-1937. However, it is also a memorial to friendship in two ways: as a complete sculpture (catalogue raisonné 425) and as a detailed cast 'Head of the Güstrow Memorial of Honour' (catalogue raisonné 426). We have Barlach's friends to thank for the fact that the complete sculpture still exists. Shortly after the artist's death in 1938, they had another cast made based on the existing model and hid it after 'The Floating Man' was classified as 'degenerate' by the Nazi authorities in 1937, removed from the cathedral and finally even melted down. It now hangs in the Antoniterkirche in Cologne and could in turn be used to make another cast for its original location. Barlach's masterpiece thus returned to Güstrow Cathedral in 1953 and has since then commemorated the victims of the world wars of 1914-1918 and 1939-45, with the dates engraved in stone beneath it. The 'Head of the Güstrow Memorial of Honour', Barlach's detailed cast from 1930, is also a document of a direct artistic friendship. Its facial features are quite clearly - although 'unintentionally', as Barlach later claimed - those of his artist friend Käthe Kollwitz. Her work was also ostracised in National Socialist Germany. In 1936, her works were removed from the Berlin Academy exhibition. From then on, she was practically no longer present as an artist. In retrospect, the 'Head of the Güstrow Monument of Honour' seems like a premonition of a community of fate: it is the portrait of an artist who Barlach admired as a friend and who, like him, soon faced difficult times. The special features of this edition: made of fine bronze, cast by hand using the lost wax technique. Moulded directly from the original and reduced in size. Limited to 980 copies, individually numbered, with foundry mark. ars mundi exclusive edition, published in collaboration with the Ernst Barlach Gesellschaft. With numbered certificate of authenticity and limitation. Version as a wall object. Detail cast of the 'Schwebender' (WVZ 424, 1927), first executed in 1930 (WVZ 426). Size 22.5 x 24 x 15 cm (W/H/D), weight 4.5 kg. With wall mounting.