Property from the Marie-Louise von Motesiczky Charitable Trust

MARIE-LOUISE VON MOTESICZKY (AUSTRIAN 1906-1996)
Village in Tyrol
signed Motesiczky (upper right)
oil on canvas
71.1 x 97 cm (27 7/8 x 38 1/8 in)
Painted in 1953

EXHIBITED:
Munich, Städtische Galerie, Erna Dinklage, Marie-Louise Motesiczky, 1954, no. 116
London, Beaux Arts Galerie, Marie-Louise Motesiczky, 1960, no. 24, titled Village festival
Vienna, Wiener Secession; Linz, Neue Galerie der Stadt, Wolfgang Gurlitt Museum; Munich, Galerie Günter Franke; Bremen, Kunsthalle, Marie-Louise Motesiczky, 1966-1968, no. 31

LITERATURE:
R. Vorderwülbecke, Marie-Louise von Motesiczky, on how to re-establish the stature of a late artist within the art market, MA thesis, Sotheby's Institute, London, 1999, pp. 42 & 99, illustrated
I. Schlenker, Marie-Louise von Motesiczky 1906-1996, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, New York, 2009, pp. 234-235, no. 121, illustrated

In the summer of 1952 Motesiczky stayed in a farm house in the alpine village of Judenstein in the Tyrol. She wrote enthusiastically to Elias Canetti at the time that it was: 'indescribably beautiful... it is very wonderful here!' She recounted that: 'Yesterday, Sunday, there was a big festival here in Judenstein ... fancy-dress pageant led by Andreas Hofer on horseback, crazily decorated oxen, a wedding couple in a carriage, young and old, huntsmen and two wooden canons which fired formidably. A dance floor in the forest - one cheery band and one dance band - but the people were happy and loved to dance...' (Schlenker, p. 234).

Completed in early 1953 from the sketches and notes that Motesiczky had made on site, the present work celebrates the theme of 'the crazily decorated oxen' adorned with an elaborate head-dress of leaves and flowers. The animal is led by a cow girl sporting a similarly fanciful bonnet made from branches, with a child in a red dress walking by her side. To the right of the composition appear two huntsmen in local costume.

Motesiczky recorded in her diary that the finished painting was shown in an exhibition at Roland Browse and Delbanco on Cork Street the same year. And that summer she returned to Judenstein in the Tyrol to share its pleasures with Elias Canetti.