Renee Sintenis Kneeling Elephant. Bronze 1936

Renée Sintenis – Kneeling Elephant, Bronze, Berlin 1936 Renée Sintenis (Glatz/Silesia 1888 – Berlin 1965) · Foundry H. Noack Berlin · WVZ Buhlmann 222 · WVZ Berger/Ladwig 155

A bronze with dark brownish-red antique patina, depicting a young elephant kneeling, modelled by Renée Sintenis in 1936. Height 7 cm · length 12.4 cm · depth approx. 5.5 cm. Monogrammed RS under the right rear leg · foundry stamp H. NOACK BERLIN on the underside. Fine bronze with beautiful antique patina.

In 1936, Sintenis modelled two kneeling elephants — the present model, at 7 cm in height (WVZ Buhlmann 222), is the more intimate of the two: its posture is freer, less static, the surface animated by irregular incisions characteristic of her late modelling. It represents the culmination of the young elephant motif she had first explored in 1926 (WVZ 220), revisited ten years later with still greater formal mastery.

All of Sintenis's animal representations proceeded from sustained observation of the living model and precise studies of movement. Sintenis expressed her approach in these terms: "One thing only I have known very early, with regard to animals: each animal must be developed in its own beauty, and then one gives it the fulfilment of its existence, the happiness of its life — what we have unlearned or forgotten to feel." The surface of the present bronze — irregular, flickering, sometimes rough — is the direct expression of this philosophy: bronze as the memory of gesture, not as academic perfection.

Renée Sintenis (born Renate Alice Sintenis, Glatz/Silesia, 20 March 1888 – West Berlin, 22 April 1965) studied at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Berlin from 1907. From 1913 she had all her works cast at the Hermann Noack fine art foundry in Berlin — a collaboration that lasted her entire life. Rainer Maria Rilke, convinced from the outset by her work, arranged her first sales. In 1928 she won the bronze medal at the Amsterdam Olympic Games for her Footballer. In 1931 she became the second woman — after Käthe Kollwitz — to be appointed to the Berlin Academy of Arts. Her Berlin Bear is the design for the Berlinale's Golden Bear award. Her works are held in the collections of the Nationalgalerie in Berlin, the Georg-Kolbe-Museum, the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum in Cologne and numerous public museums.

• Height: 7 cm · Length: 12.4 cm · Depth: approx. 5.5 cm
• Material: bronze · dark brownish-red antique patina
• Signatures: monogram RS (right rear leg) · foundry stamp H. NOACK BERLIN (underside)
• Modelled: 1936
• Catalogue raisonné: WVZ Buhlmann 1987, no. 222 · WVZ Berger/Ladwig/Wenzel-Lent 2013, no. 155
• Literature: Buhlmann, Britta E., Renée Sintenis – Werkmonographie der Skulpturen, Darmstadt 1987 · Berger/Ladwig (eds.), Renée Sintenis – Das plastische Werk, Berlin 2013 · Senator für Volksbildung/Haus am Waldsee, Renée Sintenis – Das plastische Werk, Zeichnungen, Graphik, Berlin 1958, no. 64 · Paul Appel, Renée Sintenis, Berlin 1947 · Gustav Eugen Diehl, Renée Sintenis, Berlin n.d.
• Public collections: Nationalgalerie Berlin · Georg-Kolbe-Museum Berlin · Wallraf-Richartz-Museum Cologne · international public collections
• Condition: very good · beautiful antique patina

Seen in museums — available to you.

Available for viewing by appointment at our Düsseldorf gallery.

Keywords integrated: Renée Sintenis, kneeling elephant bronze 1936, Noack Berlin, WVZ Buhlmann 222, Berger Ladwig 155, Berlin animal sculpture, Academy of Arts Berlin, Berlinale Golden Bear