AIC's 47th Annual Meeting

"Still Life at the Window" (1950) by Werner Heldt was acquired by the Harvard Art Museums in 2017 in the context of the exhibition "Inventur: Art in Germany, 1943-55", an investigation into the art produced in Germany at the end of, and immediately after, the Second World War. Technical investigation of the painting undertaken at the Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies represents the first known material study of Heldt’s work. While he is a relative unknown in the US, Werner Heldt was a prolific and important figure in mid-century Berlin. Primarily consisting of paintings and drawings, Heldt’s work depicts the city of Berlin in varying degrees of abstraction; key objects and themes recur, including picture frames, instruments, crowds, and the ocean, building a story of loss and fear in pre- and post-war Germany. This is particularly clear in "Still Life at the Window", a work from the series "Berlin by the Sea", in which an abstracted still life is set against waves crashing through Berlin. Technical study of "Still Life at the Window" was undertaken in order to clarify the unusually large abstract shape in the foreground of the still life, which appeared to have been re-worked, and to learn more about the materials Heldt used during the post-war period, a time of material scarcity. An anomaly in "Still Life at the Window", the abstract form was similar to shapes seen in Heldt’s later paintings, suggesting that the painting may present a key transitional moment in his oeuvre. Imaging with x-radiography and near-infrared photography revealed a thoughtfully designed composition in which Heldt can be seen actively negotiating between figurative and abstract painting, making many small changes. XRF, FTIR, and GC-MS were used to investigate his materials, revealing Heldt’s modification of certain colors to achieve specific effects. These findings, underscored by his deliberate, creative approach to paint application, demonstrate the importance of "Still Life at the Window" to Heldt and position it as a seminal work in his move towards abstraction. Conservation issues related to Heldt’s modification of his paint were also explored, as were the development and use of PVA-based ground preparation, which was found on Heldt’s commercially-prepared canvas.