36. Rest After [1919.]

The excellent draftsman and erotophile Robert Auer, with his numerous acts of girls with pretty faces and voluptuous curves, created a typified prototype of beauties from the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. Offering the public a "sweetened" erotica, often veiled in some ancient myth or even biblical theme, Auer won many followers during his long creative career. The painting REST AFTER is composed without the "protective" allegorical allusiveness and the naked body of a sleeping mature woman is immersed in a boudoir interior of subdued light, which contributes to the sensuality of the scene. The painter's typical idealization of the mise-en-scene is neglected in this act and the scene of a relaxedly curved body bursts with sensuality, and the whole composition is more real, in a word more vital in terms of the lust it suggests. The realism manifested by the flesh and curves of the body and the multiple wrinkled sheet of subdued pink tone against an even darker bed and its background, are actually Auer's step into "naturalism" that strives for objective and uncompromising representation of reality. At the end of the 19th century, the Art Nouveau style in European centers was already on the wane, which the great Croatian painter did not miss, but, it should also be added, he was not particularly impressed either and continued to move within the framework of the Art Nouveau style through the second and third decades of the 20th century. More precisely, within the framework of the rudiments of Munich secession under the auspices of which Auer formed his artistic expression. Therefore, we appreciate this act as a special and important painter's work in his oeuvre. It was a step towards modernity which, along with his proverbial mastery in execution, demonstrated a sovereign openness towards the depiction of boudoir intimacy. Objectively and without idealizing finesse, the painting "Rest After" deserves a particularly high place in Auer's oeuvre. BRP

Dimensions

width 63 cm, height 50 cm

Description

oil on canvas, signed and dated lower left, partially, "R. AUER 1919."

Dating

1919.

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