Czére Andrea szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei (Budapest, 2007)

ANNUAL REPORT - A 2007. ÉV - MÁRTON OROSZ: Picasso, Klee, Kandinsky: Masterpieces of the Swiss Rupf Collection

artists became the focal point of his attention. As early as in 1908 Kahnweiler sold Rupf the painting entitled Houses in l'Estaque, one of Picasso's strongly defined landscapes built out of geometric elements and regarded by some as the eponym of Cubism. This painting can be found together with two other small canvases also painted by Picasso in 1908 (Landscape, Head of a Man) on the wall opposite the entrance to the exhibition. During that same year when Picasso painted these three paintings the Swiss collector became familiar with the works of Georges Braque in Kahnweiler's gallery, and from this point regularly purchased works by Braque. Between the two world wars he acquired valuable works by Juan Gris, Fernand Léger and Henri Laurens. The most important of these were also included in the Budapest exhibition material. From 1903 the Rupfs developed a special relationship with the Swiss painter Paul Klee and his wife Lily. The Rupfs supported the Swiss painter, introduced him to Kahnweiler and as a member of the Klee-Gesellschaft, founded in 1946, they were for a while considered as the most significant collectors of Klee's art, owning approximately one hundred and eighty of his works. Although at a later stage they sold of! the bulk of the pictures, they never parted with the seventeen most beautiful works that formed the core of the collection. With five exceptions all of these were made available to the Hungarian public. The couple also bought prominent works by the German Dadaist artist Hans Arp, who settled in Switzerland. However, the most important change in the collectors' concept of art collecting was inspired by Klee's sensitivity to the fantastic while Surrealism became the driving force in their new acquisitions and André Masson the primarily focus in their collection of Surrealist art. WASS

11 Y KANDINSKY, LIGHT CONSTRUCTION, BERN, RUIT COLLECTION