Wilhelm Ohm (1905-1965), Double Portrait with Chairs, circa 1950

Expressive portrait of a man and a woman looking directly at the viewer as well as indicated chairs. The execution of a series of chair paintings served Wilhelm Ohm (1905 Stettin - 1965 Hamburg) in the postwar period to explore the transition of three-dimensionality into the plane and the composition structured by color planes, whereby real image intertwines with the abstract intrinsic structure of the work. A variant of this series is illustrated in Birgit Götting: Wilhelm Ohm - Das zeichnerische und malerische Werk. Munich 1994, p. 101, fig. 50: "The artist uses the towering chair backs and the seat fitted between the bodies to depict concrete spatiality as well as a colored surface division to connect the bodies against the orange background." As part of the Lost Generation, Ohm tried to make up for lost time in the postwar years through expressively charged works like this one. The work is stamped "Atelier Ohm, Röntgenstraße 57, 2000 Hamburg 63" on the reverse and signed in pencil. Framed behind glass in a black lacquered wooden frame. Inscribed "Wilhelm Ohm 1905-1965" on the Passepartout. Image size: 68 x 94 cm Tempera on paper