LEO PUTZ (GERMAN, 1869-1940)

Elegantly dressed figures convene with a leisurely air in the sun-dappled light under the framing branches of a tree, the feast of a picnic laid out on a rug before them. In the present lot, Leo Putz takes similar themes from works by Manet (Déjeuner sur l'herbe, 1862-3) and Monet (Déjeuner sur l'herbe, 1865-6) which he would have seen whilst studying at the Académie Julian in Paris and re-imagines them with his own expressionist style. This work relates to a painting by Putz of the same subject in the collection of the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlung in Munich (see Helmut Putz, Leo Putz, Gauting, 1994, vol. II, p. 636, no. 259).