Paul Klee (1879-1940)

Painted in 1924 at the height of Klee's involvement with the Bauhaus, Gespenst der Ersten Geliebeten, or 'Spectre of the First Lover', is a magical, light-hearted and fanciful portrait of the frightening and seemingly unexpected ghost-like apparition of an ex-lover.

Branded with the number '1' imprinted in black in the middle of her forehead as a way of indicating that she is the 'first' in an apparent sequence of lovers, this patchwork-faced female with her clumsily arranged features, mad frizzy hair, stern string of pearls and smart evening dress is a comic-horror figure seemingly arise from some dark recess of the artist's mind. Materializing like a genie against the misty watercolour gloom of the painting's background, this ghostly figure is a comic assemblage of disparate but distinct forms from her screw-shaped eyes and wire-like hair to the v-sign of her crotch and the taught wire progression of her necklace. Magically coalescing together to form a somewhat totemic image that bears a strong resemblance to the many extraordinary puppet-figures that Klee continuously assembled from household materials at this time for his son Felix's puppet-theatre, this memorable figure is a powerful and humorous graphic incarnation of a forsaken and somewhat disgruntled ex-lover.