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Dimensions: 673 by 402mm; 26 1/2 by 16 in

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Provenance: PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE SWISS COLLECTION

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Notes: The arrival of Kirchner's woodcut press in Davos from Berlin was an exiting moment for the artist. It allowed him to start a new series of large coloured woodcuts depicting Davos and its surroundings. wettertannen, together with wintermondnacht (d.390) of the same year, are considered his best woodcuts of the early Davos years.
Dr Annemarie Dube-Heynig describes the powerful effects of wettertannen in the following words: The slim, delicate blue stems reach to the sky like pillars from their mossy bed, and their heads seem to touch the clouds, communing with the tops of the mountains. The deep blue of the branches and the sky combines with the green of the undergrowth. The clouds shine clear, and the men on the track are small beneath the trees (in: Annemarie Dube-Heynig, Kirchner. Graphic Work, Munich: Prestel Verlag, 1961, p.89). These fir trees, which Kirchner also represented in other contemporary works, bordered the path that led from his house in Davos to the Stafelalp. He mentions working on this woodcut twice in his diary, on October 8 and 9 1919. The fact that some impressions are dated 1918 however, suggests that the artist had already started working on this block the year before.

Only three other impressions of this print are known, in the Kunstmuseum Basel; Kunsthaus Zurich; Private European Collection.

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