In the summer of 1989, a young couple from Munich discovered a crate of books on a street in Schwabing that had obviously been put there with the bulky waste. In it a copy of Emil Nolde’s youthful memories “The Own Life”. However, it was not the expressionist painter’s autobiographical lines that aroused the young people’s curiosity, but a watercolor that adorned the inside of a book as a frontispiece. They got advice from a well-known antiquarian in the university district, who in turn sent them to the experts at the Karl & Faber auction house.
There, the young people’s hope that the bulky waste they found could be something special soon became a certainty. The book that they saved from destruction en passant was from 1931 and the watercolor “Bearded Man and Blond Girl” by Nolde was a real treasure. In the fall season of 1989/90 it was auctioned off by Karl & Faber and fetched more than 280,000 marks plus premium instead of the estimated 50,000 marks. The Southgerman newspaper later reported on an “exciting bidding war” that drove the price up.
This is just one of many anecdotes contained in the book “First, second, 100th.” is torn. Rupert Keim, co-owner, managing director and auctioneer of Karl & Faber since 2003, and Sheila Scott, not only auctioneer but also co-managing director since 2008, published it for the anniversary. And of course you can also learn a lot about the history of the auction house in the handy and yet extremely substantial book.
Rupert Keim took over the auction house in 2003 together with his brother and sister-in-law.
(Photo: Martin Piechotta / Karl & Faber)
Auctioneer Sheila Scott has been a co-managing director at Karl & Faber since 2008.
(Photo: Verena Kathrein / Karl & Faber)
The 32-year-old Germanist Curt von Faber du Faur from Stuttgart, son of an army general and a noblewoman, and the 30-year-old art historian Georg Albert Josef Karl, son of a lawyer from Mitterfels in Lower Bavaria, founded it in 1923 – as an art and literature – Antiquarian bookshop with warehouse sale. The two very different men got to know each other “in the trenches of the First World War,” as the book says. Business is going well right from the start. Karl & Faber held the first auction in May 1927, at which Victor Manheimer’s collection was auctioned off and a first edition of the “Simplizissimus” from 1669 was sold for 1750 gold marks. Every few years you move to larger salesrooms and to more upmarket addresses.
In the summer of 1931, a good eight years after the antiquarian bookshop was founded, Curt von Faber du Faur left the joint company. The “good baron” and “distinguished gentleman”, as he is known, married a rich American woman in 1928 and emigrated to the United States with her and his 7,000-volume private library in 1939. He became a guest lecturer at Harvard and went to Yale as a professor of literature in 1944. He remains attached to the company he co-founded, initially also financially, and dies in January 1966 at the age of 75 in the USA.
The “good baron” Curt von Faber du Faur.
(Photo: Karl & Faber)
Georg Karl was considered an authoritarian character.
(Photo: Karl & Faber)
Louis Karl, the son of the founder Georg Karl, ensured a family working atmosphere.
(Photo: Karl & Faber)
Georg Karl, on the other hand, was struggling in the late 1930s, although he had been a member of the NSDAP since 1933 and also sold to Nazi greats. But his opportunism gets him through the Nazi era. He later stylized himself as a “silent resister and disadvantaged by the regime.” In the 1947 arbitration board proceedings, he was classified as a follower, but received a new license just three months later.
Now Georg Karl focuses primarily on art auctions. In 1961, his son Louis joined the company and expanded the collaboration with the US art market that his father had started. But customers from overseas also lost out when a small-format portrait drawing of Franz Liszt was snatched from under their noses by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres in the fall of 1965. Who is the unknown Swiss bidder who is paying more than 120,000 marks for the leaf, which is estimated at 25,000 marks?
The story behind it is hilarious: the drawing was owned by Richard Wagner’s family. The 22-year-old Wolf-Siegfried, known as “Wummi”, took the picture with him from Wahnfried and put it up for auction in order to raise money. When grandmother Winifred notices this, she rages and asks a Swiss acquaintance to discreetly increase the picture back on behalf of the family. Well, discretion won’t work – and with the exception of one family in Bayreuth, the incident is amused everywhere.
From 1965 onwards, Karl & Faber also regularly organizes art exhibitions. The artists often come to the openings themselves, also to the house on Amiraplatz, where Karl & Faber has been based since 1977 and to this day. A nice story about it reads something like this in the book: In 1982, the French illustrator Tomi Ungerer came to the opening of his exhibition. But in the early afternoon he asked for a very rare whiskey, which not only presented the employees with a procurement problem, but also aroused concern as to what condition Ungerer would be in by the evening. But he was doing great and “the now relaxed Ungerer” later took plenty of time for the book signing.
The auction house Karl & Faber has been based at Munich’s Amiraplatz since 1977.
(Photo: Karl & Faber)
While Georg Karl, who died in Munich in 1979 at the age of 87, is known for his authoritarian character, his son Louis Karl ensures a family working atmosphere. The employees call each other “Kafas” and go on excursions together. After the noughties, Louis Karl was looking for a successor – and was initially unsuccessful. But at the Isar bowling in Munich-Giesing, a nephew of Louis Karl tells his school friend Rupert Keim, who has just returned from studying in London and actually wants to practice as a copyright lawyer, about the open succession situation. And contrary to his previous plans, he, his brother Christoph and his sister-in-law Nicola joined Karl & Faber in 2003.
This marks the beginning of a new era for Karl & Faber. Especially after the turn of the millennium, records were set: Erich Heckel’s view of “Park von Dilborn II.” from 1914 brought more than 830,000 euros in 2007. Alfons Walde’s “The Rise”, painted around 1929, will be auctioned in 2016 for 762,500 euros. And Heinrich Campendonk’s painting “Girl with Cat” from 1918 will go under the hammer in 2017 for 975,000 euros.
In the 100th year of its existence, the former antiquarian bookshop Karl & Faber is considered an auction house for modern and contemporary art. The anniversary book has meanwhile been sold 315 times. In addition, the company is involved in charity events and supports young artists with sponsorship awards. The book goes into this as well as restitutions, collections, donations and private sales. It is thanks to the latter, for example, that the two self-portraits by Elisabeth Epstein from 1911 recently became part of the Lenbachhaus collection in Munich.
Whether at Auction house Karl & Faber treasures from the bulky waste continue to turn up? Rupert Keim smiles. Much that is actually valuable still ends up on the street. And some then at the auction house Karl & Faber.
Rupert Keim / Sheila Scott (eds.): First, second, 100th, Karl & Faber – Art auctions since 1923, Carl Hanser Verlag, 28 euros