FERDINAND HODLER (Bern 1853-1918 Geneva) Lake Geneva with Mont-Blanc in the early morning hours, March. 1918. Oil on canvas. Dated and signed below on the right: 1918 F. Hodler. 66 × 80.5 cm. Provenance: - With Galerie Moos, Geneva, 1918-1957. - Auction Galerie Moos, Geneva, 23 March 1935, lot 94, as "Le Mont-Blanc". - Collection Arthur Stoll, Arlesheim, from 1957. - Heirs of Arthur Stoll estate 1971-1994. - Auction Galerie Kornfeld, Bern, 24 June 1994, lot 51, as "Genfersee und Montblanc-Kette vor Sonnenaufgang". - Prominent Swiss private collection, acquired at the auction above. Exhibited: - Geneva 1918, Exposition Ferdinand Hodler, Galerie Moos, 11.5.-30.6.1918, no. 181, as "Lever de soleil". - Likely Basel 1919, memorial exhibition Ferdinand Hodler, Kunsthalle Basel, 18 May - 22 June 1919, no. 115, as "Le Mont-Blanc, aurore". - Likely Geneva 1920, Expositions: Joseph Communal. Newell Marshall. A. Sandoz. A. Stockmann. Art ancien. Art moderne, Galerie Moos, November and December 1920, no. 181, as "Le Mont-Blanc au lever du soleil". - Bern 1921, Hodler memorial exhibition, Kunstmuseum Bern, 20 August - 23 October 1921, no. 642, as "Mont Blanc bei aufgehender Sonne". - Munich 1925, Ferdinand Hodler. Born 1853 in Bern. Died 1918 in Geneva, Moderne Galerie Heinrich Thannhauser, September 1925, no. 67, as "Mont Blanc bei Sonnenaufgang". - Likely Geneva 1928, Exposition Ferdinand Hodler, Galerie Moos, 15 May - 30 June 1928, no. 81, as "Le Mont-Blanc, Lever du soleil". - Likely Geneva 1930, Exposition. Les maîtres de la peinture contemporaine, Galerie Moos, May 1930, no. 42, as "Lac et Mont-Blanc, lever du soleil". - Likely Geneva 1936, Ferdinand Hodler. Exposition organisée à l'occasion du XIVe Congrès international d'Histoire de l'Art, Galerie Moos, 8.9.-6.10.1936, no. 84, as "La chaîne du Mont-Blanc, lever du soleil". - Geneva 1938, F. Hodler. Exposition commémorative à l'occasion du XXe anniversaire de sa mort, Galerie Moos, 19.5.-19.6.1938, no. 122, as "Le Mont-Blanc au lever du soleil". - New York 1940, Exhibition of paintings by Ferdinand Hodler 1853-1918, Durand-Ruel Galleries, 13 May-31 May 1940, no. 10, as "Le Mont-Blanc à l'aurore". - San Francisco 1940, Paintings by Ferdinand Hodler, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, July and August 1940, no. 10, as "Le Mont-Blanc à l'aurore". - Geneva 1950, Exposition F. Hodler 1853-1918, Musée de l'Athénée, 8 September - 21 September 1950, no. 56. - Arlesheim 1953, Works of art from private collections in Arlesheim, Kirchgemeindehaus Arlesheim, 13-28 June 1953, likely no. 5. - Vienna 1962/63, Ferdinand Hodler. 1853-1918. organised by Kulturamt der Stadt Wien, Secession, 6.11.1962-6.1.1963, no. 85, as "Genfersee und Montblanc-Kette vor Sonnenaufgang". - Zurich and Biel 1964, Ferdinand Hodler. Landschaften der Reife und Spätzeit, Kunsthaus Zürich; Städtische Galerie Biel, 22.2.-5.4.1964; 17.4.-24.5.1964, No. 133. (only exhibited in Zurich.) - Wetzikon, Bülach and Schwamendingen 1970, Ferdinand Hodler exhibition, no. 53. - Trubschachen 1970, 4th exhibition of Swiss painters Trubschachen. The Welschland. 25 artists with 160 paintings from museums and private collections, Trubschachen gymnasium, 20 June - 12 July 1970, no. 109, as "Lake Geneva and the Mont Blanc chain". - Trubschachen 1982, 10th painting exhibition Trubschachen. 22 artists with around 190 works, Kulturverein Trubschachen, 19 June - 11 July 1982, no. 56. - Berlin, Paris and As 1983, Ferdinand Hodler, Nationalgalerie Berlin; Musée du Petit Palais; Kunsthaus Zürich, 2 March - 24 April 1983; 11 May - 24 July 1983; 19 August - 23 October 1983, No. 217. - La Tour-de-Peilz 1985, Peintres du Léman, Château, 26 April - 27 May 1985, No. 18, as "Lac Léman avec banc de nuages". - Trubschachen 1990, 13th painting exhibition Trubschachen. Paths to colour. Swiss painters from the turn of the century to the present day, Kulturverein Trubschachen, 23 June - 15 July 1990, no. 19. - Vienna 1992/93, Ferdinand Hodler and Vienna, Österreichische Galerie, 21 Oct. 1992-6 Jan. 1993, no. 57. - Munich and Wuppertal 1999/2000, Ferdinand Hodler, Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung; Von der Heydt-Museum, 25 June-10 October 1999; 24 October 1999-3 January 2000, no. 100. - Madrid 2001, Ferdinand Hodler. Fundación "la Caixa", Madrid, 5 Oct. - 25 Nov. 2001, no. 51, as "El lago Léman y el Mont-Blanc al alba". - Bern and Budapest 2008, Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Kunstmuseum Bern; Museum of Fine Arts Budapest, 9 April - 10 August 2008; 7 September - 14 December 2008, no. 159, as "Lake Geneva with Mont-Blanc in the early morning, March". - New York and Riehen 2012/2013, Ferdinand Hodler. View to Infinity, Neue Galerie; Fondation Beyeler, 20.9.2012-7.1.2013; 27.1.-26.5.2013, No. 42, as "Lake Geneva with Mont Blanc, Early Morning, March". Literature: - Carl Albert Loosli: General catalogue in: Ferdinand Hodler. Leben, Werk und Nachlass, Suter 1921-24, no. 1499, "Mont Blanc at sunrise". - Werner Y. Müller: The Art of Ferdinand Hodler. Complete presentation. Volume 2: Maturity and late work 1895-1918, Landscape catalogue, Zurich 1941, no. 619, as "Mont Blanc at sunrise". - Werner Y. Müller: The Art of Ferdinand Hodler. Complete presentation. Volume 2: Maturity and late work 1895-1918, Landscape catalogue, Zurich 1941, p. 301. - Hugo Wagner: Hodler Ferdinand. Painter. Draughtsman. Graphic artist. Sculptor, in: Künstlerlexikon der Schweiz. XX. century, Frauenfeld 1958-1967, vol. I, p. 448, as "Lake Geneva Landscape". - Marcel Fischer: Collection Arthur Stoll. Skulpturen und Gemälde des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts, Zurich 1961, p. 72, no. 409 (with ill.). - Hans A. Lüthy: Ferdinand Hodler. Sixteen pictures from the Arthur Stoll Collection. With an introduction by Hans A. Lüthy, Zurich and Stuttgart 1964, no. 15 (with ill.). - Hansjakob Diggelmann: Die Werke Ferdinand Hodlers in der Collection Arthur Stoll, 1972, p. 129, no. 86 (with ill.). - Guido Magnaguagno: Landscapes. Ferdinand Hodler's contribution to symbolist landscape painting, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 319. - Dieter Honisch: The late work, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 456. - Jura Brüschweiler: Ferdinand Hodler (Bern 1853-Geneva 1918). Chronological overview: Biography. Work. Reviews, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 168. - Felix Baumann: Thoughts on Colour, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 363. - Cornelia Reiter: Catalogue of paintings and drawings, in: Ferdinand Hodler und Wien. Österreichische Galerie Oberes Belvedere Wien, Vienna 1992, p. 222 (with ill.). - Guido Magnaguagno: Landscapes 1904-1918. with text excerpts by Ferdinand Hodler, Dieter Honisch, Georg Simmel and Willy Burger, in: Ferdinand Hodler und Wien. Österreichische Galerie Oberes Belvedere Wien, Vienna 1992, p. 104. - Jura Brüschweiler: Ferdinand Hodler. Collection Steiner, Zurich 1997, p. 220 (with ill. no. 76). - Jura Brüschweiler: Le chant du cygne de Ferdinand Hodler. Essai sur la relation entre oeuvres peintes et témoignages écrits, in: Ferdinand Hodler et Genève. Collection du Musée d'art et d'histoire Genève, p. 91 (with ill. no. 23). - Bernadette Walter: Biography, Ostfildern 2008, p. 374. - Paul Müller: Aspekte der Landschaft im Werk Ferdinand Hodlers, in: Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Ostfildern 2008, p. 262. - Christian Klemm: Das Licht in der Kunst Ferdinand Hodlers, Ostfildern 2008, p. 336. - Oskar Bätschmann and Paul Müller: Ferdinand Hodler. Catalogue raisonné of the paintings, ed. Swiss Institute for Art Research, vol. II, Die Landschaften, Zurich 2012, p. 456, no. 589 (with ill.). In autumn 1917, due to a lingering bout of pneumonia, Ferdinand Hodler was forced to abandon his poorly heated studio in the Acacias district of Geneva and work from his flat on the Quai du Mont-Blanc. Hodler's inconvenience was art history's gain: a series of impressive views of Lake Geneva with Mont Blanc, painted from Hodler's flat, which have become the painter's artistic legacy. The work to be auctioned is one of this series of eighteen paintings, which were created up until his death in May 1918. Thanks to the catalogue of the retrospective exhibition at the Galerie Moos in Geneva on 11 May 1918 - which Hodler visited shortly before his death - the painting can be dated to March of that year. Hodler had moved into the flat at 29 Quai de Mont-Blanc in December 1913. The panorama from there - with the 'petit lac' end of Lake Geneva, the Mont Salève and the distant Mont Blanc range - had already been captured by the artist in 1914 in a few paintings, in which the striking horizontal line of the row of houses on the opposite bank is overlapped by the summit of Geneva's 'local' mountain and, in some versions, the shoreline is populated by a series of rhythmically grouped swans. In the last series of works, to which this picture belongs, Hodler largely avoided anecdotal details or any references to civilisation. The view was painted early in the morning before sunrise, as in eleven other versions. The remaining seven works, painted in the afternoon, are dominated by colder shades of blue. The pictorial field of the present view, tuned to a complementary blue-yellow chord, is divided horizontally into several zones, with the line of the mountain range dividing the composition into two. Above the strip of shore, painted in brown and white, the bright blue shades of the lake's surface are awakened by the yellow reflection of the morning light. The opposite bank is marked by a darker strip of trees and houses hidden by the morning fog. Above it extends the mountain range, delineated by the artist with a dark brushstroke, the blue tones of which contrast with the intense yellow of the morning sky. The horizon is marked by the triangle of the Môle mountain on the left, the broad Mont Blanc massif and, on the right, the nearby Petit Salève. Towards the upper edge of the picture, the yellow fades into light pastel shades. Hodler often used the so-called Dürer disc to precisely transfer the contour of a model and, in isolated cases, of a landscape. Observing the landscape from his flat, the artist seems to have used the window itself as a kind of Dürer disc, as Johannes Widmer writes: 'For these pictures, he created diagrams across the entire width of the window of his room, painted in blue and red oil lines, which sharply reproduced the various silhouettes of the lake and mountains. These contours provided the framework for the landscapes, which were painted broadly and fluidly. [1] Repeated forms, symmetries and parallels are compositional devices within Hodler's theory of 'parallelism'. According to the artist, they are an expression of the structural laws of nature, to which animate - including human - and inanimate matter are equally subject. Hodler's view of the tendency of all objects towards the horizontal as a law of nature is also linked to death as human destiny (think, for example, of the series of works featuring the dying Valentine Godé-Darel): 'Tous les objets ont une tendance à l'horizontale, à s'aplanir sur la terre, comme l'eau, en cherchant une base toujours plus étendue. The mountain is descending, levelling out over the centuries until it is as flat as the surface of the water. L'eau va de plus en plus vers le centre de la terre, ainsi que tous les corps.' [2] In this sense, Hodler's last paintings are not mere snippets of a specific landscape, but represent allegorically a timeless law of nature. The large symbolist figure paintings and portrait commissions of recent years had demanded a great deal of energy from the artist and often required him to make compromises, so it was his dream to henceforth paint only landscapes, as he confided to the art critic Johannes Widmer while walking home from his studio after seeing the lake: 'I will also paint different landscapes than before, or at least the ones I have painted so far, differently. Do you see how everything over there dissolves into lines and space? Don't you feel as if you were standing at the edge of the earth, communing freely with space? That's what I'll paint from now on. [...] In any case, I will only paint pictures of my own accord, no more commissions. Landscapes like these, planetary landscapes!' [3] The term 'planetary' aptly describes the essence of this series of works: they are an expression of an allegorical vision of nature that transcends its concrete topographical appearance. Alberto Giacometti, who held Hodler in high regard since his youth, seems to have felt the same way, saying once: 'It is as if these landscapes were made by someone who stands outside this world. [4] In Hodler's work, colour and form serve a pictorial order that allegorically represents the laws of nature. 'Formes en rythmes, order enhanced by colour. Hodler noted in a sketchbook. [5] His contemporaries already considered Hodler to be a painter to whom colour was subordinate to form. However, in his later work, Hodler increasingly detached himself from the local colours associated with the forms and found his way to a freer use of colouring. He formulated this development in the following manner to Johannes Widmer: 'I have neglected colour and put it aside for the ideas that I devoted myself to for years: to form, to line, to composition. [...] And now I have both, and more than ever colour not only accompanies form, but form lives, curves through colour. And now it is glorious. Now I have the large spaces.' [6] Paul Müller [1] Johannes Widmer, Von Hodlers letztem Lebensjahr, Zurich: Rascher & Cie. Verlag, 1919, p. 45. [2] Carl Albert Loosli, Ferdinand Hodler. Leben, Werk und Nachlass, Bern: Suter, vol. 4, pp. 214-215. [3] Johannes Widmer, Von Hodlers letztem Lebensjahr, Zurich: Rascher & Cie. Verlag, 1919, pp. 8-9. [4] Quoted from René Wehrli, Report of the Gottfried Keller Foundation 1963-1965, pp. 71f. [5] Carl Albert Loosli, Ferdinand Hodler. Leben, Werk und Nachlass, Bern: Suter, vol. 4, p. 214. [6] Johannes Widmer, Von Hodlers letztem Lebensjahr, Zurich: Rascher & Cie. Verlag, 1919, p. 43. ------------------------------------------------- FERDINAND HODLER (Bern 1853-1918 Geneva) Lake Geneva with Mont Blanc in the early morning, March. 1918. Oil on canvas. Dated and signed lower right: 1918 F. Hodler. 66 × 80.5 cm. Provenance: - Galerie Moos, Geneva, 1918 to 1957. - Arthur Stoll Collection, Arlesheim, 1957 to 1971, acquired from the above. - Heirs of Arthur Stoll, 1971 to 1994. - Auction Galerie Kornfeld, Bern, 24 June 1994, lot 51. - Important Swiss private collection, acquired at the above auction. Exhibitions: - Geneva 1918, Exposition Ferdinand Hodler, Galerie Moos, 11 May-30 June 1918, no. 181, as "Lever de soleil" (verso with stamp). - Probably Basel 1919, memorial exhibition Ferdinand Hodler, Kunsthalle Basel, 18 May - 22 June 1919, no. 115, as "Le Mont-Blanc, aurore". - Probably Geneva 1920, Expositions: Joseph Communal. Newell Marshall. A. Sandoz. A. Stockmann. Art ancien. Art moderne, Galerie Moos, November and December 1920, no. 181, as "Le Mont-Blanc au lever du soleil". - Bern 1921, Hodler memorial exhibition, Kunstmuseum Bern, 20 August - 23 October 1921, no. 642, as "Mont Blanc bei aufgehender Sonne". - Munich 1925, Ferdinand Hodler. Born in Bern in 1853. Died 1918 in Geneva, Moderne Galerie Heinrich Thannhauser, September 1925, no. 67, as "Mont Blanc bei Sonnenaufgang" (verso with label). - Probably Geneva 1928, Exposition Ferdinand Hodler, Galerie Moos, 15 May - 30 June 1928, no. 81, as "Le Mont-Blanc, Lever du soleil". - Probably Geneva 1930, Exposition. Les maîtres de la peinture contemporaine, Galerie Moos, May 1930, no. 42, as "Lac et Mont-Blanc, lever du soleil". - Probably Geneva 1936, Ferdinand Hodler. Exposition organisée à l'occasion du XIVe Congrès international d'Histoire de l'Art, Galerie Moos, 8.9.-6.10.1936, no. 84, as "La chaîne du Mont-Blanc, lever du soleil". - Geneva 1938, F. Hodler. Exposition commémorative à l'occasion du XXe anniversaire de sa mort, Galerie Moos, 19 May - 19 June 1938, no. 122, as "Le Mont-Blanc au lever du soleil" (label on verso). - New York 1940, Exhibition of paintings by Ferdinand Hodler 1853-1918, Durand-Ruel Galleries, 13 May-31 May 1940, no. 10, as "Le Mont-Blanc à l'aurore" (label on verso). - San Francisco 1940, Paintings by Ferdinand Hodler, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, July and August 1940, no. 10, as "Le Mont-Blanc à l'aurore". - Geneva 1950, Exposition F. Hodler 1853-1918, Musée de l'Athénée, 8 September - 21 September 1950, no. 56. - Arlesheim 1953, Works of art from private collections in Arlesheim, Arlesheim parish hall, 13-28 June 1953, probably no. 5. - Vienna 1962/63, Ferdinand Hodler. 1853-1918, exhibition organised by the Cultural Office of the City of Vienna, Secession, 6.11.1962-6.1.1963, no. 85, as "Genfersee und Montblanc-Kette vor Sonnenaufgang" (verso with label). - Zurich and Biel 1964, Ferdinand Hodler. Landschaften der Reife und Spätzeit, Kunsthaus Zürich, 22 Feb. - 5 Apr. 1964; Städtische Galerie Biel, 17 Apr. - 24 May 1964, no. 133 (label on verso). - Wetzikon, Bülach and Schwamendingen 1970, Ferdinand Hodler exhibition, no. 53. - Trubschachen 1970, 4th exhibition of Swiss painters Trubschachen. The Welschland. 25 artists with 160 paintings from museums and private collections, Trubschachen gymnasium, 20 June - 12 July 1970, no. 109, as "Lake Geneva and the Mont Blanc chain". - Trubschachen 1982, 10th Trubschachen painting exhibition. 22 artists with around 190 works, Kulturverein Trubschachen, 19 June - 11 July 1982, no. 56 (label on verso). - Berlin, Paris and Zurich 1983, Ferdinand Hodler, Nationalgalerie Berlin, 2 March - 24 April 1983; Musée du Petit Palais, 11 May - 24 July 1983; Kunsthaus Zurich, 19 August - 23 October 1983, no. 217. - La Tour-de-Peilz 1985, Peintres du Léman, Château, 26 April - 27 May 1985, no. 18, as "Lac Léman avec banc de nuages". - Trubschachen 1990, 13th painting exhibition Trubschachen. Paths to colour. Swiss painters from the turn of the century to the present day, Kulturverein Trubschachen, 23 June - 15 July 1990, no. 19. - Vienna 1992/93, Ferdinand Hodler and Vienna, Austrian Gallery, 21 Oct. 1992-6 Jan. 1993, no. 57. - Munich and Wuppertal 1999/2000, Ferdinand Hodler, Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung, 25 June - 10 October 1999; Von der Heydt-Museum, 24 October 1999 - 3 January 2000, no. 100. - Madrid 2001, Ferdinand Hodler. Fundación "La Caixa", Madrid, 5 Oct. - 25 Nov. 2001, no. 51, as "El lago Léman y el Mont-Blanc al alba". - Bern and Budapest 2008, Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Kunstmuseum Bern; Museum of Fine Arts Budapest, 9 April - 10 August 2008; 7 September - 14 December 2008, no. 159, as "Lake Geneva with Mont-Blanc in the early morning, March". - New York and Riehen 2012/2013, Ferdinand Hodler. View to Infinity, Neue Galerie, 20.9.2012-7.1.2013; Fondation Beyeler, 27.1.-26.5.2013, no. 42, as "Lake Geneva with Mont Blanc, Early Morning, March". Literature: - Exhib. cat. Exposition Ferdinand Hodler, Geneva 1918, p. 29, no. 181. - Exhib. cat. Memorial Exhibition Ferdinand Hodler, Basel 1919, p. 9, no. 115, - Carl Albert Loosli: General catalogue in: Ferdinand Hodler. Leben, Werk und Nachlass, Suter 1921-24, no. 1499, as "Montblanc bei Sonnenaufgang". - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler. Born 1853 in Bern. Died 1918 in Geneva, Munich 1925, no. 67. - Exhib. cat. F. Hodler. Exposition commémorative à l'occasion du XXe anniversaire de sa mort, Geneva 1938, no. 122. - Exhib. cat. Exhibition of paintings by Ferdinand Hodler 1853-1918, New York 1940, no. 10 (with illus.). - Werner Y. Müller: The Art of Ferdinand Hodler. Gesamtdarstellung, vol. II. Maturity and late work 1895-1918. landscape catalogue, Zurich 1941, no. 619, as "Montblanc bei aufgehender Sonne". - Werner Y. Müller: The Art of Ferdinand Hodler. Gesamtdarstellung, vol. II. Maturity and late work 1895-1918, Zurich 1941, p. 301. - Exhib. cat. Exposition F. Hodler 1853-1918, Geneva 1950, no. 56. - Hugo Wagner: Hodler Ferdinand. Painter. Draughtsman. Graphic artist. Sculptor, in: Künstlerlexikon der Schweiz. XX. century, Frauenfeld 1958-1967, vol. I, p. 448, as "Lake Geneva Landscape". - Marcel Fischer: Arthur Stoll Collection. Skulpturen und Gemälde des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts, Zurich 1961, p. 72, no. 409 (with illus.). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler. Landschaften der Reife und Spätzeit, Zurich and Biel 1964, p. 49, no. 133 (with illus., no. 16). - Hans A. Lüthy: Ferdinand Hodler. Sixteen pictures from the Arthur Stoll Collection. With an introduction by Hans A. Lüthy, Zurich and Stuttgart 1964, no. 15 (with illus.). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler exhibition, Wetzikon, Bülach and Schwamendingen 1970, no. 53. - Exhib. cat. 4th exhibition of Swiss painters, Trubschachen. The Welschland. 25 artists with 160 paintings from museums and private collections, Trubschachen 1970, p. 34, no. 109. - Hansjakob Diggelmann: Die Werke Ferdinand Hodlers in der Sammlung Arthur Stoll, 1972, p. 129, no. 86 (with illus.). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler, Berlin, Paris and Zurich 1983, p. 486, no. 217 (with illus., p. 446). - Guido Magnaguagno: Landscapes. Ferdinand Hodler's contribution to symbolist landscape painting, in: in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 319. - Dieter Honisch: Das Spätwerk, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 456. - Jura Brüschweiler: Ferdinand Hodler (Bern 1853-Geneva 1918). Chronological overview: Biography. Work. Reviews, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 168. - Felix Baumann: Thoughts on Colour, in: Ferdinand Hodler, Zurich 1983, p. 363. - Exhib. cat. Peintres du Léman, Château, La Tour-de-Peilz 1985, p. 18 (with illus.). - Exhib. cat. 13th painting exhibition Trubschachen. Paths to colour. Swiss painters from the turn of the century to the present day, Trubschachen 1990, p. 9, no. 19. - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler and Vienna, Vienna 1992, p. 222, no. 57 (with illus.). - Cornelia Reiter: Katalog der Gemälde und Zeichnungen, in: Ferdinand Hodler und Wien, p. 222 (with illus.). - Guido Magnaguagno: Landscapes 1904-1918, with excerpts from texts by Ferdinand Hodler, Dieter Honisch, Georg Simmel and Willy Burger, in: Ferdinand Hodler and Vienna. Österreichische Galerie Oberes Belvedere Wien, Vienna 1992, p. 104. - Jura Brüschweiler: Ferdinand Hodler. Steiner Collection, Zurich 1997, p. 220 (with illus., no. 76). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler, Munich and Wuppertal 1999/2000, p. 281, no. 100 (with illus., p. 176). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler, Madrid 2001, p. 115, no. 51 (with illus.). - Jura Brüschweiler: Le chant du cygne de Ferdinand Hodler. Essai sur la relation entre œuvres peintes et témoignages écrits, in: Ferdinand Hodler et Genève. Collection du Musée d'art et d'histoire Genève, Geneva 2005, p. 91 (with illus., no. 23). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Bern and Budapest 2008, p. 338, no. 159 (with illus.). - Paul Müller: Aspekte der Landschaft im Werk Ferdinand Hodlers, in: Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Ostfildern 2008, p. 262. - Bernadette Walter: Biography, in: Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Ostfildern 2008, p. 374. - Christian Klemm: Das Licht in der Kunst Ferdinand Hodlers, in: Ferdinand Hodler. A Symbolist Vision, Ostfildern 2008, p. 336. - Oskar Bätschmann and Paul Müller: Ferdinand Hodler. Catalogue raisonné of the paintings, ed. Swiss Institute for Art Research, vol. II, The Landscapes, Zurich 2012, p. 456, no. 589 (with illus.). - Exhib. cat. Ferdinand Hodler. View to Infinity, New York and Riehen 2012/2013, p. 106, no. 42. In the autumn of 1917, Ferdinand Hodler was forced to avoid his poorly heated studio in the Acacias district of Geneva and stay in his flat on the Quai du Mont-Blanc due to a lung infection. It is not least due to these external circumstances that art history owes a series of impressive views of Lake Geneva with Mont Blanc, which Hodler painted from his flat and which have become the painter's true artistic legacy. The work to be auctioned belongs to this series, which comprises 18 versions and was created up until his death in May 1918. Based on the catalogue entry for the retrospective, which was shown at the Galerie Moos in Geneva from 11 May 1918 and which Hodler visited shortly before his death, the painting can be dated to March 1918. Hodler had moved into the flat at Quai du Mont-Blanc no. 29 in December 1913. The artist captured the panorama of the bay of Geneva, Mont Salève and the distant Mont Blanc chain in several paintings the following year. In these motifs, the striking horizontal line of the row of houses on the opposite shore is framed by the crest of Geneva's local mountain; in some versions, the strip of shore in the foreground is populated by a row of rhythmically grouped swans. In the last series of works, to which the present picture belongs, Hodler largely dispensed with anecdotal details or references to civilisation. The view was painted in the early morning before sunrise, as were eleven other versions. In the other versions, created in the afternoon, the colder blue tones predominate. The picture's foursquare in the present view, tuned to the complementary blue-yellow chord, is divided horizontally into several zones, with the horizontal of the mountain range dividing the composition in half. Above the brown and white strip of shore, the light blue tones of the lake surface are enlivened by the yellow reflection of the morning light. The opposite shore is marked by a darker strip of trees and houses obscured by the morning mist. Above it stretches the mountain range, emphasised by the artist with a dark line, whose blue tones contrast with the intense yellow of the morning sky. The horizon is marked from the left by the triangle of the Môle, the broad Mont Blanc massif and the nearby Petit Salève on the right. Towards the upper edge of the picture, the yellow fades to light pastel colours. Hodler often used the so-called Dürer disc to accurately transfer the outline of a model and, in some cases, a landscape. In his balcony room on the Quai du Mont-Blanc, the artist seems to have used the window itself as a kind of Dürer disc, as Johannes Widmer writes: "For these pictures, he laid out diagrams along the entire width of the window in his balcony room, painted in blue and red oil lines, which reproduced the various silhouettes of the lake and mountains with sharpness. These contours formed the skeleton of the broad and fluidly painted landscapes." (Johannes Widmer, Von Hodler's last year of life, Zurich 1919, p. 45). Repetitions of form, symmetries and parallels are compositional devices and manifestations of Hodler's theory of "parallelism". According to the artist, they are an expression of the structural laws of nature, to which animate - including human beings - and inanimate matter are equally subject. The tendency of all objects towards the horizontal, which Hodler regarded as a law of nature, is also linked to death as a human fate (think of the series of works by the dying Valentine Godé-Darel, for example): "Tous les objets ont une tendance a l'horizontale, à s'applanir sur la terre, comme l'eau, en cherchant une base toujours plus étendue. The mountain slopes downwards, it becomes more and more level like the surface of the water. L'eau va de plus en plus vers le centre de la terre, ainsi que tous les corps." (Carl Albert Loosli, Ferdinand Hodler. Leben, Werk und Nachlass, vol. IV, Bern, p. 214 f.) In this sense, Hodler's last paintings are not mere excerpts from a specific piece of landscape, but symbolise a timeless regularity of nature. After the large Symbolist figure paintings and the portrait commissions of the last few years had demanded a great deal of energy from the artist and he often had to make compromises, his dream was to paint only landscapes from then on, as he confided to the art critic Johannes Widmer while contemplating the lake on a walk home from the studio: "I will also paint other landscapes than I have done so far, or at least the previous ones differently. Do you see how everything over there merges into lines and space? Don't you feel as if you were standing on the edge of the earth and communicating freely with the universe? This is what I will paint from now on. [...] In any case, I will only paint pictures of my own accord, no more commissions. Landscapes like this one, planetary landscapes!" (Johannes Widmer, Von Hodlers letztem Lebensjahr, Zurich 1919, p. 8 f.). The term "planetary" aptly describes the essence of this series of works: they are the expression of a symbolic vision of nature that transcends the concrete topographical appearance. Alberto Giacometti, who held Hodler in high esteem since his youth, also seems to have felt this way, as he once commented: "It is as if these landscapes were made by someone who is outside this world." (Quoted from René Wehrli, Report of the Gottfried Keller Foundation 1963-1965, p. 71 f.) In Hodler's work, colour and form are at the service of a pictorial order that represents the laws of order of nature in a parable-like manner. "Formes en rhythmes, order heightened by colour. " Hodler recorded in a sketchbook (Carl Albert Loosli, Ferdinand Hodler. Leben, Werk und Nachlass, vol. IV, Bern, p. 214). Even his contemporaries regarded Hodler as a painter for whom colour was subordinate to form. In his late work, however, Hodler increasingly freed himself from the local colours tied to the forms and found his way to a freer use of colour. He described this development to Johannes Widmer as follows: "I have put colour to one side, neglected it, above the thoughts I have devoted for years to form, to the outline, to composition. [...] And now I have both, and more than ever the colour not only accompanies the form, but the form lives, curves, through the colour. And now it's marvellous. Now I have the big spaces." (Johannes Widmer, Von Hodlers letztem Lebensjahr, Zurich 1919, p. 43). We would like to thank Paul Müller, co-author of the catalogue raisonné of Ferdinand Hodler's works, for this catalogue entry.