Dirk Filarski (1885-1964)

Mrs. Renée Smithuis has suggested that the present lot depicts the area around the Vierwaldstättersee in Switzerland, where Filarski worked from mid March until the end of April 1917.


Smithuis considers Filarski's second Swiss period, from August 1916 until the end of April 1917, the most fascinating period of his working life. Only there would he fully develop into a pur sang expressionist. Working in three different places, the Vierwaldstättersee would be his last stop before returning to the Netherlands. Here his style became looser, leaving more space for the rythm of the landscape. Filarski depicted the rolling slopes with an unprecedented impressive use of colour, being applied to the canvas in broad brush strokes. The exhibition of his latest work in Amsterdam in May of the same year was received with great enthusiasm. N.H. Wolf, editor of De Kunst wrote: "With his new work, from 1917, Filarski shows himself to be, not only a luminist, but also as a wonderful colourist. Marvellous, the sight of these 70 paintings is truly surprising, if not overwhelming!".
(R. Smithuis, D.H.W. Filarski. Zwervend schilder van de Bergense School, Warnsveld 2005, pp. 102-103.)