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The Dissolution

Print
1921 (made)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Although he spent most of his adult life living in Paris, the painter and graphic artist Konstanty Brandel often visited his native Poland and continued to consider himself a Polish artist. His work may be described as Symbolist and has much in common with that of figures such as Odilon Redon and Gustave Doré, although Hieronymus Bosch, Giovanni Battista Piranesi and Francisco de Goya have also been cited as possible influences.

Brandel’s imagery often includes architecture with exaggerated and highly improbable structures, scale and perspective. These fantasies are frequently inhabited by men, women and animals engaged in strange or ritualistic behaviour and sometimes endowed with supernatural powers such as the ability to float or fly. Biblical and mythological material is sometimes conveyed through a kind of obsessive agoraphobia, as in this Dissolution, a kind of Last Judgement scene in which thousands of bodies appear to be both falling and floating through a vaguely suggested ampitheatre.


Object details

Categories
Object type
TitleThe Dissolution (assigned by artist)
Materials and techniques
Drypoint and etching printed in brown
Brief description
Konstanty Brandel: 'La Dissolution' [The Dissolution], drypoint and etching, 1921.
Physical description
A kind of 'Last Judgement' scene. Thousands of falling, floating or whirling figures, some more clearly drawn than others, against a ground of some architectural structure, not clearly defined, like an amphitheatre.
Dimensions
  • Plate height: 30.3cm
  • Plate width: 22.7cm
  • Sheet height: 50cm
  • Sheet width: 33cm
Style
Production typeProof
Copy number
proof 1/10
Marks and inscriptions
  • 128 Brandel (Number and signature in pencil, below the plate, on right.)
  • epr s-p-s 1-10 (Proof number on the left.)
    Translation
    epr[euve] =proof
Credit line
Given by the artist’s uncle, Witold Leitgeber
Subjects depicted
Summary
Although he spent most of his adult life living in Paris, the painter and graphic artist Konstanty Brandel often visited his native Poland and continued to consider himself a Polish artist. His work may be described as Symbolist and has much in common with that of figures such as Odilon Redon and Gustave Doré, although Hieronymus Bosch, Giovanni Battista Piranesi and Francisco de Goya have also been cited as possible influences.

Brandel’s imagery often includes architecture with exaggerated and highly improbable structures, scale and perspective. These fantasies are frequently inhabited by men, women and animals engaged in strange or ritualistic behaviour and sometimes endowed with supernatural powers such as the ability to float or fly. Biblical and mythological material is sometimes conveyed through a kind of obsessive agoraphobia, as in this Dissolution, a kind of Last Judgement scene in which thousands of bodies appear to be both falling and floating through a vaguely suggested ampitheatre.
Associated objects
Bibliographic reference
Konstanty Brandel Muzeum Narodow w Warszawie, Galeria Szfuki Wspolczesnej. Warsaw Listopad- grudzien 1977. Prints cat no. 207
Collection
Accession number
E.1447-1993

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Record createdAugust 31, 2006
Record URL
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