Humor, fragility and passage · 1915 -1940

Archangels, candidates and still hesitant angels become imperfect, funny and moving beings in Klee, located between the human world and the invisible.

Paul Klee depicted angels occasionally as early as the 1910s, but the motif took on exceptional importance at the end of his life. In 1939, he created twenty-nine works devoted to these figures. Sick and exiled to Switzerland after leaving Nazi Germany, Klee did not paint triumphant celestial messengers. His angels are candidates, forgetful, still feminine, poor or groping. The title often gives the first key, then a flexible line, some signs and a light color make up a being who was both spiritual and very human. Angel Applicant seems to be waiting for an uncertain admission; Angel Applicant seems to be waiting for an uncertain admission; Angel Applicant seems to be waiting for an uncertain admission; Angel Applicant seems to be waiting for an uncertain admission; Angel, still groping, advances without assurance; Archangel retains something monumental but also vulnerable. This ambiguity is their strength: the angel embodies perfection less than passage, learning and the possibility of transformation. The "Angels of Paul Klee" selection notably compares Archangel - Paul Klee and Angel Applicant - Paul Klee. Its reading favors atmosphere.

Klee's angels have not left humanity: they still hesitate, learn and smile on the threshold of another world.