Paul Klee (1879-1940)

During Klee's time as a teacher at the newly relocated Dessau Bauhaus from 1925-1931, he plunged into drawing with "barbaric fury" (W. Grohmann, Paul Klee, London, 1957, p. 273). Klee developed what Grohmann has called his "melodic line" (ibid., p. 266), a continuous, unbroken and flowing drawn line, that begins at one point and moves about the surface of the sheet guided only by the artist's impulse. It creates an entirely closed and unified image. Related to the automatic drawing of the Surrealists, the melodic line may be used to render specific imagery, as in Mädchen mit Puppe, or to create symbolic and abstract forms. The crossing of lines in loops and knots define component shapes in the image, and add a whimsical element to the present work.