Paul Citroen - Photographs New York Thursday, October 4, 2018 | Phillips

Photographs

New York Auction 4 October 2018

  • Provenance

    Sotheby's, London, 2 May 1997, lot 19

  • Literature

    Berliner Illustrirte Zeitung 24, 14 June 1925: 743
    Moholy-Nagy, Painting, Photography, Film (Munich, 1925), p. 95
    Franz Roh, Nach-expressionismus: magischer Realismus; Probleme der neuesten Europäischen Malerei (Leipzig, 1925), p. 141
    Pásmo: revue internationale modern 2, nos. 6-7, 1926, cover
    The Museum of Modern Art, Object:Photo. Modern Photographs: The Thomas Walther Collection 1909-1949, pl. 14
    Van Rheeden, Paul Citroen: kunstenaar, docent, verzamelaar, p. 110

  • Catalogue Essay

    In 1919, Paul Citroen began his series of groundbreaking urban collages, of which the current example, Metropolis, 1923, is the best known. Initially affiliated with the Berlin Dadaists, Citroen studied at the Bauhaus in Weimar from 1922 to 1925. Metropolis was recognized early on as an important image and was reproduced extensively in the 1920s, most notably in László Moholy-Nagy’s seminal book, Painting, Photography, Film. This print bears the stamp of a Weimar photo studio indicating that it was made prior to Citroen’s return to Berlin in 1925. Another print of this image is in the Thomas Walther Collection at The Museum of Modern Art, New York.

99

Paul Citroen

Metropolis

1923
Gelatin silver print.
8 x 6 in. (20.3 x 15.2 cm)
Signed, annotated in pencil, 'Hüttich-Demler, Weimar' stamp (canceled) and annotated in an unidentified hand in pencil on the verso.

Estimate
$10,000 - 15,000 

Sold for $21,250

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Photographs

New York Auction 4 October 2018