Max Silberberg

Polish, died c. 1944

Explore Selected Works

A young girl with pale skin and long brown hair looks at us as she braces a tall, wooden hoop with one hand by her hip in this vertical painting. The girl stands close to us with her body angled to our right, and she looks at us from the corners of her dark blue eyes. Her delicate nose, rosy cheeks, and closed, rose-pink lips are set in a heart-shaped face. She has wavy, chestnut-brown hair that falls loosely around her shoulders. Bangs brush across her forehead, and her hair is pulled back in half, tied in a pale blue ribbon. She wears a sky-blue dress with a ruffle around the wide collar. The long sleeves are rolled back over her wrists, and the dress is tied at the waist with an aquamarine-blue sash tied into a bow at her lower back. The knee-length skirt flares out from the waist. She wears ice-blue socks pulled halfway up her shins and black, low-heeled Mary Jane-style shoes tied with bows over the arches. One foot turns to rest on the bottom edge of the wooden hoop she braces with her left hand, farther from us. She holds a short stick by her side with the other hand. The ground around her is painted with blended areas of muted topaz blue, peach, and canary yellow. The top third of the background is a loosely painted garden, with lime and spring-green leaves, and a cluster of shell-pink flowers to our right. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower left corner, “Renoir. 85.”
Auguste Renoir, Girl with a Hoop, 1885, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.58

Girl with a Hoop

Auguste Renoir · 1885 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1963.10.58

Wilhelm Leibl, Malresl Working in the Kitchen, c. 1898, graphite with stumping and erasures on polished wove paper, Wolfgang Ratjen Collection, Patrons' Permanent Fund, 2007.111.117

Malresl Working in the Kitchen

Wilhelm Leibl · c. 1898 · graphite with stumping and erasures on polished wove paper ·  Accession ID  2007.111.117

Shown from the waist up, a woman with pale, peachy skin reads a book with one elbow propped on a grassy bank in this horizontal painting. The woman’s body is angled to our right, and she looks down at a pale green-covered book held in her right hand, which is in the lower left corner of the composition. The woman has dark brows over hooded eyes, and her dark brown hair falls loosely behind her shoulders. She has a round face, straight nose, and pale lips. She touches her hair with her left hand, to our right, with that pinky delicately crooked. One strap of a sleeveless, pearl-white chemise falls off the shoulder of that arm, and the dress nestles around her belly, revealing much of the other breast. Leafy trees and gray rocks are loosely painted behind her. The artist signed the painting in the lower right corner, “G. Courbet.”
Gustave Courbet, A Young Woman Reading, c. 1866/1868, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.114

A Young Woman Reading

Gustave Courbet · c. 1866/1868 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1963.10.114

Bibliography

1931

  • Scheffler, Karl. "Die Sammlung Max Silberberg." Kunst und Künstler XXX (October 1931): 3+

1932

  • "The Sale of the S...& S... Collections." _Formes XXV (May 1932):282+

1999

  • Watson, Peter and Sharne Thomas. "Holocaust Widow set to win back UKP.3m painting." Times of London (3 June 1999).

2001

  • Heuss, Anja. "Die Sammlung Max Silberberg in Breslau." In Die Moderne und ihre Sammler: französische Kunst in deutschem Privatbesitz vom Kaiserreich zur Weimarer Republik. Berlin, 2001: 312-325.