?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,000
JULIUS USSY ENGELHARD (1883-1964) UDET U. GREIM FLIEGEN. 1919. 47 3/8x34 3/8 inches. Oscar Consee, Munich. Condition A-: minor restoration in margins. Engelhardt studied at the Akademie in Munich under von Stuck. He went on to do illustrations for the magazine Simplicissimus and was a prolific poster designer. He specialized in fashion images and elegant bars, which he advertised in his mannerist Art Deco style. This image is a departure for him. Promoting an Aerobatic show by Germany's best and most revered pilots, he provides an incredibly daring and dynamic composition of two planes flying in an improbably dangerous manoeuvre. By all accounts the airshow really was a daredevil performance of the highest risk. The star pilots, Ernst Udet and Robert Greim, were both aviation heroes of the First World War, each receiving Germany's highest decoration, the Order of Merit. Between the two of them, they could count over 80 downed Allied pilots, and Greim was actually knighted. Such was their passion for aviation that after the war they turned to airshows to support themselves and teamed up as an aerobatic duo. During the Second World War they were both recruited into the Luftwaffe by Hermann Goering. Udet had a key position in reorganizing the German Airforce, and played a key role in organizing the Battle of Britain. He committed suicide in 1941. Greim rose to the rank of Marshall and took over control of the Luftwaffe when Goering was removed from the position. He committed suicide after the war to prevent himself from being turned over to the Russians.
