Footnotes

Provenance
Gifted to a French collection by a philhellene collector in early 20th century.
Private collection, Athens.

This masterwork of Gysis's famous Bavarian genre showcases his incisive observation, narrative thrust, and consummate ability to capture a scene's moment and turn it into a compelling and beguiling work of art.

In a humble and sparse rural kitchen setting with few utensils, an old woman in black headscarf has momentarily paused peeling an apple to affectionately hold the doll of her granddaughter who is kneeling in front of her. It is possible that she is asking her granny to put her doll to sleep as if it were a real baby. The child's palpable impatience to see the outcome of her wish lovingly contradicts the condescending smile of her grandmother who seems to play along and enjoy the scene. Body language is remarkably natural and highly talkative, displaying Gysis's aptitude to exploit the anecdotal with humorous finesse and convey a sense of cheerfulness that immediately engages the viewer. Moreover, the artist endows this graceful painting with an added quality, a sense of 'momentary stillness', also evident in his famous The betrothal of children in the Athens National Gallery. The scene is perceived as a moment in time, a brief, almost instantaneous halt in the unfolding of the narrative.

Fascinated by the child's world, Gysis painted children of all ages, from infants to adolescents, often contrasting their solemn expressions to the playful disposition of their grandparents.¹ Notably, he used the same two figures as his main characters in Grandmother dancing with her grandchildren, a painting known only from an archive slide.²

Gysis sketched similar kitchen settings and home interiors mostly while touring the villages of Bavaria and Tirol.³ In the late summer of 1883, he went on vacation to Brixlegg and made excursions to the valleys of Inn and Ötz as far as Innsbruck, sketching a lot along the way.⁴. The Bonhams picture evolved from such drawings and was painted right after his return to Munich.

¹ See K. Didaskalou, Genre- and Allegorische Malerei von Nikolaus Gysis, München 1991, dissertation LMU, pp. 122, 123.
² See N. Misirli, Gysis, Adam editions, Athens 1995, no. 104, p. 156. The grandmother's face also resembles the countenance of his Old woman's head in the National Gallery in Athens (see ibid, no. 77, p. 131).
³ Compare sketches of kitchen interiors from Inntal and Ötztal (September 1883) in K. Didaskalou, DerMünchner Nachlass von Nikolaus Gysis, München, 1993, vol. II, fig. 411, 417, 418, 422, 423, 429, 450, G21.
⁴ Letters to G. Nazos, August 26 and 27, letter to N. Nazos, September 19, 1883, Nachlasskatalog, Drawings Nr. Z 384-453.