Arno Breker (1900 Elberfeld - 1991 Düsseldorf) (F) 'Die Erwartung', bronze, brown patina, modelled in 1978, height 30 cm, signed, numbered 117/150, plinth lacking Literature: Wvz. Egret 411/412German sculptor and architect Arno Breker was born 19th July 1900 in Wuppertal. In 1920 Breker began his studies at the Düsseldorf Art Academy. His great idol was the French sculptor Auguste Rodin. The artist described the year 1936 as a "turning point" in his life. The clear reference of his sculptures to antiquity attracted the favour of the National Socialists. Suddenly, Breker was receiving commissions and awards, joined the NSDAP in 1937, and was quickly hailed as the "Michelangelo of the Third Reich." In 1938, for example, he was commissioned to make the bust of Adolf Hitler. The artist was highly respected not only by the National Socialists, but also by the French Vichy regime.After the end of World War II, Breker fled to Bavaria, where he was acquitted in the denazification process. He received numerous private commissions, portrayed many well-known industrialists such as Hugo Henkel, Herbert Quandt and Rudolf-August Oetker, as well as the politicians Konrad Adenauer and Ludwig Erhard. He was also commissioned with architectural projects such as the construction of the office and residential buildings for the Gerling Group in Hagen in 1955.Despite numerous commissions, criticism also arose against the artist and his idealised aesthetic in the post-war period. Nevertheless, Breker was well-known in the international art world of the post-war period and cultivated friendships with Salvador Dalí ­ and Ernst Fuchs. Dalí ­ once said of the three artists, who together were known as the "Golden Triangle": "Breker-Dalí ­-Fuchs. You can turn us any way you want, we're always on top." Throughout his life, Breker dedicated himself in his work to the human body in all its beauty. Ernst Fuchs even described him as "the true prophet of the beautiful." This sensuous, " pensive female nude "The Expectation" from the 1970s is a particularly harmonious example of the way in which realism and idealism were combined in his works