The Unflinching Portrait That Set Otto Dix's Auction Record

Otto Dix's Portrait of the lawyer Dr. Fritz Glaser (1921) sold for $5.46m (£3.3m) at Sotheby's in London on October 06, 1999. The oil on canvas work had not been traded before.

Otto Dix (1891–1969) was profoundly affected by his experiences in the First World War, he fought on the Western and Eastern fronts, and its aftermath, when he portrayed wounded veterans, prostitutes and corrupt officials with an unflinching eye.

The artist's 1921 portrait of Glaser with a wintry building as a backdrop, and his group portrait of the Dresden lawyer and art collector with his family, which Dix painted four years later, help make him a leading figure of the Neue Sachlichkeit (new objectivity) movement.

With the rise of the Nazis in the 1930s, Dix's status and his often acerbic paintings made him an obvious target. His works were denounced as "degenerate" and he was dismissed from his post as a professor of art at the Dresden Academy of Art. Forced into internal exile at Lake Constance, near the Swiss border, he was permitted to paint landscapes only.

The sale beat Dix’s previous auction record by $4.68m, a 600% rise. His previous record was set by his portrait of prostitutes waiting for clients, The salon I (1921), which sold for $779,700 at Christie's on June 23, 1986.

A Brief History of Otto Dix at Auction