MUNICH.- Otto Dix, Erich Heckel and Oskar Kokoschka are just some of the famous artists whose works were part of the renowned collection of Dr. Hugo and Madeleine Simons. Two watercolors from this top-class selection will now be called up at Ketterer Kunst in Munich in the auctions from 7-9 June.

The attorney Dr. Hugo Simons was a passionate art collector and especially captivated by the art of his days. He was friends with many artists and even won a legal case for Otto Dix which set new standards in the official acknowledgment of artistic freedom. This marked the beginning of a lifelong friendship between the two men, a friendship during which the famous painting “The Portrait of the Lawyer Hugo Simons“, today on display at the Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal (MBAM) in Canada, was made.

Dr. Hugo Simons also was a great philanthropist. After he and his family had fled to Holland to escape the reign of the National Socialists in 1933, he helped many families to leave Germany, too. Not only did he find a legal loophole that allowed him to save the refugees‘ personal reserve assets, he and his wife Madeleine were also active escape agents at the risk of losing their lives. After the end of the war he did not want to return to Germany, and rejected an offer of a post as judge. He passed away in Canada in 1958.

With “Marschlandschaft“ (estimate price: € 120,0000-150,000) and “Mädchen mit blauem Haar“ (estimate price: € 90,000-120,000) two great works by Emil Nolde from the collection Dr. Hugo and

Madeleine Simons will be called up at auction. Both pictures are wonderful documents of the artist‘s mastery as well as the couple‘s personality.

While Emil Nolde renders the scant marsh landscape of his homeland in vibrant colors, capturing the dramatic lighting conditions of a vast and infinite sky with great poise, the almost mystical portrait emanates a notion of the artist‘s flight from the world. With the figure mainly captured in outlines, the girl seems to be lost in reverie. The delicate colors and the largely white sheet as means of creation underline the depicted girl‘s fragileness in a composition that does not lack in poignancy. Overall, it is a marvelous document of the artist‘s masterly handling of the watercolor technique.

The section of Modern Art in this auction offers more renowned names such as Ernst Barlach, Otto Dix, Lyonel Feininger, Conrad Felixmüller, Karl Hofer, Alexej von Jawlensky, Max Liebermann, August Macke, Koloman Moser, Gabriele Münter, Hermann Max Pechstein, Pablo Picasso, Egon Schiele, Max Slevogt and Alfons Walde. Further acclaimed works in the section of Post War/Contemporary Art are Günther Ueckers “Woge, Japan“ (estimate price: 600,000-800,000) and works by Enrico Castellani, Tony Cragg, Günther Förg, Dadamaino, Rainer Fetting, Günther Fruhtrunk, Katharina Grosse, Roberto Matta, Ernst Wilhelm Nay, A.R. Penck, Sigmar Polke, Robert Rauschenberg, Gerhard Richter, Fred Thieler, Victor Vasarely and, of course, Andy Warhol