Meditation

Alexej von Jawlensky painted this work in Switzerland in 1918. He had moved there after the First World War forced him to leave Germany. Jawlensky was born in Russia but built much of his career in Munich, where he joined artists who used strong color to express feelings and ideas. In Switzerland, he began a series called Mystical Heads, in which he simplified the human face to suggest quiet thought and prayer. The Lenbachhaus gives this work the fuller title Mystical Head: Meditation. It also points toward the small, repeated paintings called Meditations that became the main focus of his later years.