Art + Design 
15 December 2022
Art + Design 
218

Oskar Fischinger 1900–1967

Red Oval

c. 1950
oil on Masonite 26 h × 21 w in (66 × 53 cm)
estimate: $1,500–2,000
result: $4,550
follow artist
own a similar item?
free evaluation

Signed, titled, dated and inscribed to verso ‘Red Oval by Oskar Fischinger ca. 1950 #660’.
provenance: Elfriede Fischinger, Los Angeles | Acquired directly from the previous c. 1982 by Gordon Shwayder Rosenblum, Lakewood, CO | Thence by descent
literature: Fischinger: A Retrospective of Paintings and Films by Oskar Fischinger 1900-1967, Gallery 609 exhibition catalog, unpaginated

This work will ship from LAMA in Los Angeles, California.

print

Oskar Fischinger's 'Visual Music'

Oskar Fischinger was a German artist and animator and is most known for his influential short films that he described as "visual music." Pairing classical scores with organic abstraction, Fischinger's experimental animations won accolades across Europe and they were often used in advertisements and shown in theaters before films. Fischinger fled to Los Angeles in 1936 and worked in Hollywood, even contributing to Disney's Fantasia in 1940, but he found the commercialism of the industry stifling. He returned to creating his own short films but they were expensive and time-intensive; in the 1950s, Fischinger shifted his focus to painting, bringing to the medium the same energy and spirit found in his animations.

218