The Georg Reinhart Collection: a private Gesamtkunstwerk from Winterthur

Georg Reinhart (1877-1955) ranks among Switzerland’s most independent-minded collectors — a man who acquired art not according to market conditions or prestige, but by the only criterion that counted for him: the immediate persuasive power of a work and, as he wrote in his collection catalogue in 1921, his «innate joy in art». In the house «Tössertobel» above Winterthur, an ensemble grew over decades that united European and Asian sculpture, prints and painting into a private Gesamtkunstwerk.

Wotruba, Haller and a Hesse watercolour

From his estate we presented a concentrated selection: stone sculptures by Fritz Wotruba; the sensitive head of a woman by Hermann Haller, one of Reinhart’s closest artistic companions; a Ticino watercolour by Hermann Hesse from 1921; and Niklaus Stoecklin’s portrait of the collector from 1932. The principal work on paper, Félix Vallotton’s portfolio «Intimités», completed the selection.

Works from the Reinhart Collection rarely appear on the market: significant parts of it are today held by the Kunst Museum Winterthur, the Kunstmuseum Basel and the Museum Rietberg in Zurich.

The selection was offered at the Spring Auction 2026 — where the «Intimités» portfolio set a world record for prints by Vallotton at CHF 320,000.