Swans, c. 1925

The Graz-based artist Norbertine Roth (1891–1978) moved to Vienna in 1911 to study with Ferdinand Schmutzer in his ladies’ class. At first, she mostly made black prints from woodcuts. From 1921, she started working with the relatively new medium of the linocut.
In 1907 and 1911, she attended the Neu-Dachau painting school, founded 1888 by Adolf Hölzel and others.
In 1919, she married Georg von Bresslern (1892–1952) who made it his job after their wedding to take care of sales and finances as well as of the cutting of the plates to Bresslern-Roth’s designs and the printing. Of most prints, 200 copies were made. After the death of her husband in 1952, she all nut stopped making linocuts.
In most cases, the artist portrayed one species of animal per picture. The work Swans shows the birds in their natural habitat. The decorative rendering of the waves, the reflections on the water and the reeds speak to her affinity for Viennese Jugendstil graphics.

EF, 2021