Piet Ouborg - Cubist-expressionist portrait of a woman

Piet Ouborg (1893-1956). Cubist-expressionist nude from 1930. Pencil drawing. Dated 1930. Rare early work of art by this important Dutch modern artist from the last century. The drawing is in good condition. Dimensions including frame 32x24 cm. Dimensions without frame (image size) 11x11 cm. The piece has a hand-signed certificate on the back (in the frame) from the well-known twentieth-century Dutch art critic Jos de Gruyter (1899-1979). De Gruyter was museum director of the Groninger Museum and later chief curator of the Gemeentemuseum in The Hague.

Ouborg was a teacher in the Netherlands until halfway through the First World War. In 1916 he went to the Dutch East Indies where he worked as a drawing teacher and teacher. During a leave of absence in the Netherlands in 1923, Ouborg, who was self-taught, began experimenting with cubism and in 1931, while on leave again, he went to Brussels, where he discovered surrealism. He was strongly influenced by the work of the Spanish surrealist painter Joan Miró. When he finally returned to the Netherlands in 1938, he first settled in Haarlem, then in Amsterdam and finally in 1939 in The Hague, where he started teaching art history and drawing. Vincent van Gogh was a great example. During the Second World War he came into contact with later members of Cobra, the painters Karel Appel and Corneille, but he also had contact with Willem Hussem and Jaap Nanninga. In 1945, Ouborg stopped teaching and devoted himself entirely to his artistry. He was a member of Pulchri Studio, Vrij Beelden (1947 - 1955) and the Liga Nieuw Beelden (1955 - 1956).
In 1947 he exhibited his work with the Experimentelen group in the Hague Art Circle. With his work, Ouborg joined Cobra, but he did not want to be a member of that movement. In the 1950s he belonged to the working group De Nieuwe Ploeg in Voorburg. In 1950 he received - not without controversy - the Jacob Maris Prize for Drawing for his drawing Father and Son.