Portrait of Hands

Georg Kirsta (1900-1955) planned to publish a specially compiled book consisting of drawn and painted portraits of hands, presumably also because depicting hands demands a high level of craftsmanship from artists. This illustrated book was to consist of works by Kirsta as well as those that had provided inspiration throughout the history of art. His text drafts have also been tracked down and published in this Google Arts&Culture format.

For example, Kirsta thought it was perhaps unexpected, but entirely justified, to speak of the image of hands. After all, it is the human that is ultimately enchanted by the artistic craft and brought to eternal life on dead material.

It is truly astonishing that the phenomenon of the hand, which may be only perceived as an extremity by the general public, had to be continually rediscovered.

While the poets of India in the fourth century BC praised the divine quality of the fingertips, the scientists of the post-Romantic 19th-century focused on the no less important fact of the interconnection of brain and hand.

Kirsta was of the opinion that the aim was to determine the psychological totality of the depicted person through line, form and color.

In this way, the boundaries of pure portraiture have been broken and “portraits of hands” have been created, whose structure is predominantly psychological. Individual parts of the picture can be combined compositionally in such a way that the arrangement reaches into the fantastic.

The depiction of hands is a topic of art history that may never be fully apparent to the individual artist. Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), however, succeeded in rendering the essence most directly in his works The Hand of God (1912), The Cathedral (1908) and The Mystery (1908).

In the works of Diego Velázquez (1599-1660) and Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), on the other hand, the depiction is less expressive and appeals more to the intellect and soul of the viewer.

It is often a challenge for artists to realise their desired intentions when reproducing hands on paper or canvas, in stone, metal or in any other material. It is just as difficult as the portrayal of a face.

In fact, hands can have a similarly strong expression as faces. The importance of gestures in conversation should be considered here, also with regard to different cultures.

The aim of this planned publication was to bring the viewer consciously closer to the hands again, at a time when the focus was more on finding inspiration in the achievements in the machine.