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Dimensions: 31 by 45 cm., 12 1/4 by 17 3/4 in.
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Provenance: Galerie Thomas, Munich
Acquired from the above by the present owners in 1988
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Notes: The authenticity of this work was confirmed by the late Professor Dr. Martin Urban of the Nolde Stiftung, Seebüll.
PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE EUROPEAN COLLECTION
With its powerful palette and almost abstract forms, Das Meer captures the beauty and the mood of the northern landscape of Seebüll. Emil Nolde acknowledged that he would often find it easier to treat a particular subject - landscape, for example - in the medium of watercolour rather than that of oil paint. 'With infinite labour I finally achieved that freer, broader and more fluent manner of depiction for which an especially thorough understanding and re-examination of the structure and character of the paper and the inherent possibilities of colour are indispensable. But at the same time, it demands above all a capacity for developing the sensitivity of one's eye' (Emil Nolde, Reisen-Ächtung-Befreiung, Cologne, 1967, p. 27).