In addition, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner’s Das Soldatenbad (Artillerymen) bested its high estimate to sell for $22 million. Painted in 1915, immediately following Kirchner’s release from military service, the arresting canvas represents the psychological realities of war. Executed in his fully developed Expressionist pictorial style, the monumental work daringly explores the anxieties brought on by modernization in the early-20th century, while continuing to develop the artist’s preoccupation with the human body that he held since his earliest days as a member of Die Brücke. Prior to its voluntary restitution earlier this year, Das Soldatenbad had resided in the collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York for three decades. As in the past, the Flechtheim heirs are expecting to use some of the proceeds for charitable causes, and for Holocaust remembrance and education purposes.

An anchor of The Beautiful & Damned, Ludwig Meidner’s harrowing Apokalyptische Landschaft established a new world auction record for the artist when it sold for $14.1 million. Executed in 1912 near the brink of the Great War, Apokalyptische Landschaft is a cataclysmic and arresting urban scene that reflects the social, political, emotional and artistic upheaval in Germany at the time. The harrowing dual-sided image is one of approximately 15 paintings from Meidner’s series of apocalyptic landscapes executed between 1912 and 1916. Strikingly modern, the works from this series show Meidner looking at the formal experiments of both the German Expressionists and the Italian Futurists and act as a testimony to the incredible artistic innovation of this period. There are very few works from the series remaining in private hands, with important examples in international institutions including the Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin, the Saint Louis Art Museum in Missouri and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).

9930 Impressionist & Modern Art Evening Sale