Hans Dvořák, Schattiger Hohlweg, 1888

Description

Hans Dvořák (19th century). Shady hollow way in a sunny forest. Watercolor and pen, 58,5 x 43 cm (visible size), … more Hans Dvořák (19th century). Shady hollow way in a sunny forest. Watercolor and pen, 58,5 x 43 cm (visible size), 70 x 55,5 cm (frame), signed and dated lower left "Hans Dvořák [18]88".
Framed under glass.


- Into the heart of the forest -


about the work

The large-format watercolor shows a light forest landscape in the glistening light of the midday sun. Immediately in front of the viewer a stream crosses the path, its refreshing coolness is emphasized by the surrounding shadows. Beyond the stream, the terrain is brightly lit. Here, the ground-level water-fed plants present themselves in all their vegetative vigor, while the piled-up wood, faded by the strong sun, has taken on the grayish color of the rocky ground, contrasting with the green of the foliage. Between the green rug of leaves on the left and the pile of wood on the right lies the mouth of a slightly ascending, tunnel-like vaulted path, which once again leads out into the bright summer sun, so that the light blue background of the sky illuminates the dark forest passage from behind.
The sequence of light and shadow leading from the shadow of the immediate foreground of the picture into the light, from the light again into the shadowed and from there again into the imaginable light lends the picture a strong narrative dimension, which is carried by the timeless atmosphere of the midday hour. And yet - following the panta rhei of the stream - time passes. The leaves of the delicate tree standing next to the pile of dead wood have already taken on a slight autumnal hue. The picture's oscillation between narrative and atmosphere is also found on the level of artistic formation: the representational quality, clearly outlined with the pen, floats into the diffuse atmospheric through the character of the watercolor. The picture is illuminated and mysterious at the same time.
with this work, Hans Dvorak has created a close-up landscape painting inspired by plein air painting, whose intense appeal is rooted in 'naturalistic allegory' as established by Romantic landscape painting. In this way, Dvorak is completely at the height of traditional landscape painting, which was brought to its last flowering in the late 19th century, and which refers to the unfathomable creation. less