{
"data": {
"id": 166639,
"accession_number": "2008.36",
"share_license_status": "Copyrighted",
"tombstone": "Goldsmiths, 1919. Emil Nolde (German, 1876\u20131956). Oil on wood; framed: 90.2 x 72.4 x 5.1 cm (35 1/2 x 28 1/2 x 2 in.); unframed: 69 x 51 cm (27 3/16 x 20 1/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund, 2008.36",
"current_location": "225 German Expressionism & Surrealism",
"title": "Goldsmiths",
"creation_date": "1919",
"creation_date_earliest": 1919,
"creation_date_latest": 1919,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"Germany, 20th century"
],
"technique": "oil on wood",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Modern European Painting and Sculpture",
"collection": "Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 90.2 x 72.4 x 5.1 cm (35 1/2 x 28 1/2 x 2 in.); Unframed: 69 x 51 cm (27 3/16 x 20 1/16 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 0.902,
"height_inch": 35,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.5,
"width": 0.724,
"width_inch": 28,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.5,
"depth": 0.051,
"depth_inch": 2,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.0
},
"unframed": {
"height": 0.69,
"height_inch": 27,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.1875,
"width": 0.51,
"width_inch": 20,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0625
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "signed. lower right: \"Emil Nolde\"; 1919",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [],
"legacy": []
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "K\u00e4te Bernard Robinson, Berlin-Schmargendorf",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1921\u20131954",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "(Hugo Feigl Gallery, New York, NY)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1954\u20131955",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "(Stuttgarter Kunstkabinett auction, 22, Stuttgart, 1955, cat. no. 1785)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1955",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "Walter Bareiss (1919-2007), New York",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1955",
"sortorder": 4
},
{
"description": "(Eugene V. Thaw, New Gallery, New York, NY)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1955\u20131956",
"sortorder": 5
},
{
"description": "Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Marc Futter, Westfield, MA",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1956\u20132008",
"sortorder": 6
},
{
"description": "(Betty Krulik Fine Art, Ltd., New York, NY, 2008, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "2008",
"sortorder": 7
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "2008-",
"sortorder": 8
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "Emile Node once stated: \"Every color holds within it a soul, which makes me happy or repels me, and which acts as a stimulus.\"",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "A leading artist of the German Expressionist group Die Br\u00fccke (The Bridge), Nolde criticized French modernism as overly intellectual and tepid. Seeking a new art of radically simplified form and emotive color, he found inspiration in Oceanic sculpture and the medieval paintings of Matthias Gr\u00fcnewald. Deeply religious, Nolde depicted biblical subjects with a deliberately crude, ferocious vigor intended to elevate spirituality over descriptive form. This painting may allude to two goldsmiths divinely selected to make religious objects, and whose work so pleased God that Moses blessed them (Exodus 35:30-43). Such images are not literal illustrations, Nolde explained, but visions that sprang from his own imagination, driven by the spontaneous release of emotion. \"In art\" he wrote, \"I fight for unconscious creation. Labor destroys paintings.\"",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60480461"
],
"internet_archive": []
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Alfred Werner, \"Emil Nolde: A Demon of the Lower Realm,\" Artforum, vol. 2, no. 1 (1963) 21-26, reproduced in b/w p. 24",
"page_number": "",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "\"Emil Nolde Retrospective,\" Pictures on Exhibit, vol. 26, no. 6 (March 1963) 4-5, reproduced in b/w p. 5",
"page_number": "",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Peter Selz, Emil Nolde, exh. cat. (New York: : Museum of Modern Art, 1963), no. 30, reproduced in b/w p. 2",
"page_number": "",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Martin Urban, Emil Nolde: Catalogue Raisonn\u00e9 of the Oil Paintings, vol. 2 (London: Sotheby\u2019s, 1990) 208, no. 857, reproduced in b/w",
"page_number": "",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Adams, Henry. \"The Invisible Man: William Robinson.\" CAN Journal (Spring 2017): 80-83. ",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 82",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/2008.36",
"images": {},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 166639,
"creators": [
{
"id": 12713,
"description": "Emil Nolde (German, 1876\u20131956)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": null,
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1876",
"death_year": "1956",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "2008-06-23T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1919,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1919",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": false,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-09-22 12:35:55.171000"
}
}