Roberto Montenegro (1885-1968), L'epicerie du bon poète, 1939. Oil on canvas. 20 1/8 x 24 1/4 in. (51.1 x 61.6 cm.) This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York.
Virgilio Garza, Head of Department: Enigmatic and mysterious, L’epicerie du bon poête is an early, rediscovered masterpiece by Mexican artist Roberto Montenegro. This Surrealist work takes on a real-life tragic love story of tormented young lovers. Death, abandonment and unrequited love create a narrative of foreboding with all the elements of a gothic tale: a long shadow looms over the scene, a man yields a gun to himself, and a bride and groom are mere spectres in a haunted house whose façade blends with a stormy, cloudy sky. Poetic and evocative, this painting suggests Montenegro’s affinity with certain aspects of Surrealism but more importantly it is driven by his broader existential concerns about man and society. Vik Muniz (b. 1961), New York City, after George Bellows (Pictures of Magazines 2), 2011. Digital c-print. Edition six of six. 71 x 105 1/2 in. (180.3 x 267.9 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Marysol Nieves, Specialist: Vik Muniz’s bold photographs are critically engaged with the power of images. Since the mid-1990s he has created an impressive body of work based on appropriated images often culled from photojournalism and the history of art. These found images are then reconstructed from such unlikely materials as chocolate syrup, sugar, dirt, diamonds, string, garbage and magazine cutouts. The final works consist of photographs of these constructed images, or rather pictures of pictures. No doubt an heir to the 1970s Pictures Generation, Muniz seems equally adept at engaging with and exposing the artifice and deception inherent in these images. In New York City, after George Bellows (Pictures of Magazines 2), Muniz employs fragments of torn magazine pages to recreate one of the most iconic works by the early 20th century American painter George Bellows. A skilled realist painter, Bellows was deeply committed to depicting New York City’s ‘urban reality,’ in all its grandeur and grit, and his 1911 painting simply titled New York provides Muniz with a clever trope for investigating his own ideas about ‘reality’ and the limits of representation. Nahum B. Zenil (b. 1947), Señora y peces, 1985. Oil and ink on heavy paper. 26 x 20 in. (66 x 50.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Virgilio Garza, Head of Department: Nahum B. Zenil is an essential artist in the history of Mexican art that deserves a closer look. The extraordinary body of work that Zenil created in the ‘80s and ‘90s is a frank exploration of his cultural and sexual identity. A master draftsman, his quasi-surreal self-portraits quickly positioned him as a postmodern heir to Frida Kahlo and his work opened new frontiers for contemporary Mexican art of the 80s, along with Julio Galán, Rocío Maldonado and Germán Venegas, to name a few artists of his generation associated with ‘Neomexicanismo’. Highly biographical, his works touch upon themes of growing up as a homosexual in rural Mexico, his life in the big city with his lover Gerardo and his ailing mother, his Catholic upbringing and his role as an outsider in Mexican society. Señora y peces, one of a few of his masterworks that depart from the self-portrait, depicts a miraculous apparition of fertility and abundance. Luiz Zerbini (b. 1959), A Praça, 1985. Acrylic on canvas. 73 x 97 in. (185.4 x 246.4 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Diana Bramham, Specialist: I have always been drawn to paintings in which I can see earlier art historical precedents. For me, Luiz Zerbini’s A Praça is a beautiful confluence of 19th, 20th and 21st century sources. Whether intentional on the part of the artist or not, I find a little bit of Gauguin in Zerbini’s vibrant swatches of swirling colour, a touch of Degas in his skewed perspective and boldly cropped figures, a hint of Kirchner in the green pallor of the woman’s skin at lower left. Yet A Praça captures a distinctly contemporary time and place — a bustling city street in Brazil — as well as a particular art historical moment. A Praça champions a return to painting that took root in Brazil — as well as in Europe and the United States — in the 1980s with a group of artists referred to as the Geração 80. A leading figure among the Geração 80, Zerbini clearly revels here in his traditional medium, applying thick brush strokes of midnight blue, emerald green, electric yellow, hot pink and cherry red to create a technicoloured portrait of urban life. Julio Gálan (1958–2006), Relámpagos naranjas, 1989. Oil, silk flowers, plastic cherries, ribbon, and dildos on canvas. 52 x 84 1/2 in. (132.1 x 214.6 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Kristen France, Specialist: An incessant inventor of fictions, Mexican-born artist Julio Galán’s art is bursting with fantasy. His compositions reveal autobiographical truths and raw personal admissions often times masked in allegory or myth. Executed in 1989, at the height of his career, Relámpagos naranjas is a beautiful example of the dark humour tinged with melancholy that pervades Galán’s works and what gained him international recognition as one of the most promising artists of the Neomexicanismo movement of the 1980s. Symbols of carnal love — a nude Venus-like figure, ripe oranges, appliquéd cherries and dildos delicately wrapped in fabric — accompany an enigmatic note: ‘Everything in life fades except for the fruits of love and grapes dressed as orange lightning bolts.’ As Galán has been known to do, he signs the painting under an invented name ‘Shas Amo’. A small opening in the painting reveals a cartoon-like cutout of a black cat, teeth bared. Amidst the layers of suggestive images and text, the viewer is left perplexed as to what to make of it all, as though caught inside some absurd erotic dreamscape of the artist’s creation. And yet, as humorously obscure as the message appears to be, Galán’s work speaks to universal truths about the corporeal essence of our existence. Olga Albizu (1924–2005), Untitled. Oil on canvas. 36 x 25 1/2 in. (91.4 x 64.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York
Virgilio Garza, Head of Department: Enigmatic and mysterious, L’epicerie du bon poête is an early, rediscovered masterpiece by Mexican artist Roberto Montenegro. This Surrealist work takes on a real-life tragic love story of tormented young lovers. Death, abandonment and unrequited love create a narrative of foreboding with all the elements of a gothic tale: a long shadow looms over the scene, a man yields a gun to himself, and a bride and groom are mere spectres in a haunted house whose façade blends with a stormy, cloudy sky. Poetic and evocative, this painting suggests Montenegro’s affinity with certain aspects of Surrealism but more importantly it is driven by his broader existential concerns about man and society.
Vik Muniz (b. 1961), New York City, after George Bellows (Pictures of Magazines 2), 2011. Digital c-print. Edition six of six. 71 x 105 1/2 in. (180.3 x 267.9 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York.
Marysol Nieves, Specialist: Vik Muniz’s bold photographs are critically engaged with the power of images. Since the mid-1990s he has created an impressive body of work based on appropriated images often culled from photojournalism and the history of art. These found images are then reconstructed from such unlikely materials as chocolate syrup, sugar, dirt, diamonds, string, garbage and magazine cutouts. The final works consist of photographs of these constructed images, or rather pictures of pictures. No doubt an heir to the 1970s Pictures Generation, Muniz seems equally adept at engaging with and exposing the artifice and deception inherent in these images. In New York City, after George Bellows (Pictures of Magazines 2), Muniz employs fragments of torn magazine pages to recreate one of the most iconic works by the early 20th century American painter George Bellows. A skilled realist painter, Bellows was deeply committed to depicting New York City’s ‘urban reality,’ in all its grandeur and grit, and his 1911 painting simply titled New York provides Muniz with a clever trope for investigating his own ideas about ‘reality’ and the limits of representation. Nahum B. Zenil (b. 1947), Señora y peces, 1985. Oil and ink on heavy paper. 26 x 20 in. (66 x 50.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Virgilio Garza, Head of Department: Nahum B. Zenil is an essential artist in the history of Mexican art that deserves a closer look. The extraordinary body of work that Zenil created in the ‘80s and ‘90s is a frank exploration of his cultural and sexual identity. A master draftsman, his quasi-surreal self-portraits quickly positioned him as a postmodern heir to Frida Kahlo and his work opened new frontiers for contemporary Mexican art of the 80s, along with Julio Galán, Rocío Maldonado and Germán Venegas, to name a few artists of his generation associated with ‘Neomexicanismo’. Highly biographical, his works touch upon themes of growing up as a homosexual in rural Mexico, his life in the big city with his lover Gerardo and his ailing mother, his Catholic upbringing and his role as an outsider in Mexican society. Señora y peces, one of a few of his masterworks that depart from the self-portrait, depicts a miraculous apparition of fertility and abundance. Luiz Zerbini (b. 1959), A Praça, 1985. Acrylic on canvas. 73 x 97 in. (185.4 x 246.4 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Diana Bramham, Specialist: I have always been drawn to paintings in which I can see earlier art historical precedents. For me, Luiz Zerbini’s A Praça is a beautiful confluence of 19th, 20th and 21st century sources. Whether intentional on the part of the artist or not, I find a little bit of Gauguin in Zerbini’s vibrant swatches of swirling colour, a touch of Degas in his skewed perspective and boldly cropped figures, a hint of Kirchner in the green pallor of the woman’s skin at lower left. Yet A Praça captures a distinctly contemporary time and place — a bustling city street in Brazil — as well as a particular art historical moment. A Praça champions a return to painting that took root in Brazil — as well as in Europe and the United States — in the 1980s with a group of artists referred to as the Geração 80. A leading figure among the Geração 80, Zerbini clearly revels here in his traditional medium, applying thick brush strokes of midnight blue, emerald green, electric yellow, hot pink and cherry red to create a technicoloured portrait of urban life. Julio Gálan (1958–2006), Relámpagos naranjas, 1989. Oil, silk flowers, plastic cherries, ribbon, and dildos on canvas. 52 x 84 1/2 in. (132.1 x 214.6 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Kristen France, Specialist: An incessant inventor of fictions, Mexican-born artist Julio Galán’s art is bursting with fantasy. His compositions reveal autobiographical truths and raw personal admissions often times masked in allegory or myth. Executed in 1989, at the height of his career, Relámpagos naranjas is a beautiful example of the dark humour tinged with melancholy that pervades Galán’s works and what gained him international recognition as one of the most promising artists of the Neomexicanismo movement of the 1980s. Symbols of carnal love — a nude Venus-like figure, ripe oranges, appliquéd cherries and dildos delicately wrapped in fabric — accompany an enigmatic note: ‘Everything in life fades except for the fruits of love and grapes dressed as orange lightning bolts.’ As Galán has been known to do, he signs the painting under an invented name ‘Shas Amo’. A small opening in the painting reveals a cartoon-like cutout of a black cat, teeth bared. Amidst the layers of suggestive images and text, the viewer is left perplexed as to what to make of it all, as though caught inside some absurd erotic dreamscape of the artist’s creation. And yet, as humorously obscure as the message appears to be, Galán’s work speaks to universal truths about the corporeal essence of our existence. Olga Albizu (1924–2005), Untitled. Oil on canvas. 36 x 25 1/2 in. (91.4 x 64.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York
Marysol Nieves, Specialist: Vik Muniz’s bold photographs are critically engaged with the power of images. Since the mid-1990s he has created an impressive body of work based on appropriated images often culled from photojournalism and the history of art. These found images are then reconstructed from such unlikely materials as chocolate syrup, sugar, dirt, diamonds, string, garbage and magazine cutouts. The final works consist of photographs of these constructed images, or rather pictures of pictures. No doubt an heir to the 1970s Pictures Generation, Muniz seems equally adept at engaging with and exposing the artifice and deception inherent in these images. In New York City, after George Bellows (Pictures of Magazines 2), Muniz employs fragments of torn magazine pages to recreate one of the most iconic works by the early 20th century American painter George Bellows. A skilled realist painter, Bellows was deeply committed to depicting New York City’s ‘urban reality,’ in all its grandeur and grit, and his 1911 painting simply titled New York provides Muniz with a clever trope for investigating his own ideas about ‘reality’ and the limits of representation.
Nahum B. Zenil (b. 1947), Señora y peces, 1985. Oil and ink on heavy paper. 26 x 20 in. (66 x 50.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York.
Virgilio Garza, Head of Department: Nahum B. Zenil is an essential artist in the history of Mexican art that deserves a closer look. The extraordinary body of work that Zenil created in the ‘80s and ‘90s is a frank exploration of his cultural and sexual identity. A master draftsman, his quasi-surreal self-portraits quickly positioned him as a postmodern heir to Frida Kahlo and his work opened new frontiers for contemporary Mexican art of the 80s, along with Julio Galán, Rocío Maldonado and Germán Venegas, to name a few artists of his generation associated with ‘Neomexicanismo’. Highly biographical, his works touch upon themes of growing up as a homosexual in rural Mexico, his life in the big city with his lover Gerardo and his ailing mother, his Catholic upbringing and his role as an outsider in Mexican society. Señora y peces, one of a few of his masterworks that depart from the self-portrait, depicts a miraculous apparition of fertility and abundance. Luiz Zerbini (b. 1959), A Praça, 1985. Acrylic on canvas. 73 x 97 in. (185.4 x 246.4 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Diana Bramham, Specialist: I have always been drawn to paintings in which I can see earlier art historical precedents. For me, Luiz Zerbini’s A Praça is a beautiful confluence of 19th, 20th and 21st century sources. Whether intentional on the part of the artist or not, I find a little bit of Gauguin in Zerbini’s vibrant swatches of swirling colour, a touch of Degas in his skewed perspective and boldly cropped figures, a hint of Kirchner in the green pallor of the woman’s skin at lower left. Yet A Praça captures a distinctly contemporary time and place — a bustling city street in Brazil — as well as a particular art historical moment. A Praça champions a return to painting that took root in Brazil — as well as in Europe and the United States — in the 1980s with a group of artists referred to as the Geração 80. A leading figure among the Geração 80, Zerbini clearly revels here in his traditional medium, applying thick brush strokes of midnight blue, emerald green, electric yellow, hot pink and cherry red to create a technicoloured portrait of urban life. Julio Gálan (1958–2006), Relámpagos naranjas, 1989. Oil, silk flowers, plastic cherries, ribbon, and dildos on canvas. 52 x 84 1/2 in. (132.1 x 214.6 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Kristen France, Specialist: An incessant inventor of fictions, Mexican-born artist Julio Galán’s art is bursting with fantasy. His compositions reveal autobiographical truths and raw personal admissions often times masked in allegory or myth. Executed in 1989, at the height of his career, Relámpagos naranjas is a beautiful example of the dark humour tinged with melancholy that pervades Galán’s works and what gained him international recognition as one of the most promising artists of the Neomexicanismo movement of the 1980s. Symbols of carnal love — a nude Venus-like figure, ripe oranges, appliquéd cherries and dildos delicately wrapped in fabric — accompany an enigmatic note: ‘Everything in life fades except for the fruits of love and grapes dressed as orange lightning bolts.’ As Galán has been known to do, he signs the painting under an invented name ‘Shas Amo’. A small opening in the painting reveals a cartoon-like cutout of a black cat, teeth bared. Amidst the layers of suggestive images and text, the viewer is left perplexed as to what to make of it all, as though caught inside some absurd erotic dreamscape of the artist’s creation. And yet, as humorously obscure as the message appears to be, Galán’s work speaks to universal truths about the corporeal essence of our existence. Olga Albizu (1924–2005), Untitled. Oil on canvas. 36 x 25 1/2 in. (91.4 x 64.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York
Virgilio Garza, Head of Department: Nahum B. Zenil is an essential artist in the history of Mexican art that deserves a closer look. The extraordinary body of work that Zenil created in the ‘80s and ‘90s is a frank exploration of his cultural and sexual identity. A master draftsman, his quasi-surreal self-portraits quickly positioned him as a postmodern heir to Frida Kahlo and his work opened new frontiers for contemporary Mexican art of the 80s, along with Julio Galán, Rocío Maldonado and Germán Venegas, to name a few artists of his generation associated with ‘Neomexicanismo’. Highly biographical, his works touch upon themes of growing up as a homosexual in rural Mexico, his life in the big city with his lover Gerardo and his ailing mother, his Catholic upbringing and his role as an outsider in Mexican society. Señora y peces, one of a few of his masterworks that depart from the self-portrait, depicts a miraculous apparition of fertility and abundance.
Luiz Zerbini (b. 1959), A Praça, 1985. Acrylic on canvas. 73 x 97 in. (185.4 x 246.4 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York.
Diana Bramham, Specialist: I have always been drawn to paintings in which I can see earlier art historical precedents. For me, Luiz Zerbini’s A Praça is a beautiful confluence of 19th, 20th and 21st century sources. Whether intentional on the part of the artist or not, I find a little bit of Gauguin in Zerbini’s vibrant swatches of swirling colour, a touch of Degas in his skewed perspective and boldly cropped figures, a hint of Kirchner in the green pallor of the woman’s skin at lower left. Yet A Praça captures a distinctly contemporary time and place — a bustling city street in Brazil — as well as a particular art historical moment. A Praça champions a return to painting that took root in Brazil — as well as in Europe and the United States — in the 1980s with a group of artists referred to as the Geração 80. A leading figure among the Geração 80, Zerbini clearly revels here in his traditional medium, applying thick brush strokes of midnight blue, emerald green, electric yellow, hot pink and cherry red to create a technicoloured portrait of urban life. Julio Gálan (1958–2006), Relámpagos naranjas, 1989. Oil, silk flowers, plastic cherries, ribbon, and dildos on canvas. 52 x 84 1/2 in. (132.1 x 214.6 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Kristen France, Specialist: An incessant inventor of fictions, Mexican-born artist Julio Galán’s art is bursting with fantasy. His compositions reveal autobiographical truths and raw personal admissions often times masked in allegory or myth. Executed in 1989, at the height of his career, Relámpagos naranjas is a beautiful example of the dark humour tinged with melancholy that pervades Galán’s works and what gained him international recognition as one of the most promising artists of the Neomexicanismo movement of the 1980s. Symbols of carnal love — a nude Venus-like figure, ripe oranges, appliquéd cherries and dildos delicately wrapped in fabric — accompany an enigmatic note: ‘Everything in life fades except for the fruits of love and grapes dressed as orange lightning bolts.’ As Galán has been known to do, he signs the painting under an invented name ‘Shas Amo’. A small opening in the painting reveals a cartoon-like cutout of a black cat, teeth bared. Amidst the layers of suggestive images and text, the viewer is left perplexed as to what to make of it all, as though caught inside some absurd erotic dreamscape of the artist’s creation. And yet, as humorously obscure as the message appears to be, Galán’s work speaks to universal truths about the corporeal essence of our existence. Olga Albizu (1924–2005), Untitled. Oil on canvas. 36 x 25 1/2 in. (91.4 x 64.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York
Diana Bramham, Specialist: I have always been drawn to paintings in which I can see earlier art historical precedents. For me, Luiz Zerbini’s A Praça is a beautiful confluence of 19th, 20th and 21st century sources. Whether intentional on the part of the artist or not, I find a little bit of Gauguin in Zerbini’s vibrant swatches of swirling colour, a touch of Degas in his skewed perspective and boldly cropped figures, a hint of Kirchner in the green pallor of the woman’s skin at lower left. Yet A Praça captures a distinctly contemporary time and place — a bustling city street in Brazil — as well as a particular art historical moment. A Praça champions a return to painting that took root in Brazil — as well as in Europe and the United States — in the 1980s with a group of artists referred to as the Geração 80. A leading figure among the Geração 80, Zerbini clearly revels here in his traditional medium, applying thick brush strokes of midnight blue, emerald green, electric yellow, hot pink and cherry red to create a technicoloured portrait of urban life.
Julio Gálan (1958–2006), Relámpagos naranjas, 1989. Oil, silk flowers, plastic cherries, ribbon, and dildos on canvas. 52 x 84 1/2 in. (132.1 x 214.6 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York.
Kristen France, Specialist: An incessant inventor of fictions, Mexican-born artist Julio Galán’s art is bursting with fantasy. His compositions reveal autobiographical truths and raw personal admissions often times masked in allegory or myth. Executed in 1989, at the height of his career, Relámpagos naranjas is a beautiful example of the dark humour tinged with melancholy that pervades Galán’s works and what gained him international recognition as one of the most promising artists of the Neomexicanismo movement of the 1980s. Symbols of carnal love — a nude Venus-like figure, ripe oranges, appliquéd cherries and dildos delicately wrapped in fabric — accompany an enigmatic note: ‘Everything in life fades except for the fruits of love and grapes dressed as orange lightning bolts.’ As Galán has been known to do, he signs the painting under an invented name ‘Shas Amo’. A small opening in the painting reveals a cartoon-like cutout of a black cat, teeth bared. Amidst the layers of suggestive images and text, the viewer is left perplexed as to what to make of it all, as though caught inside some absurd erotic dreamscape of the artist’s creation. And yet, as humorously obscure as the message appears to be, Galán’s work speaks to universal truths about the corporeal essence of our existence. Olga Albizu (1924–2005), Untitled. Oil on canvas. 36 x 25 1/2 in. (91.4 x 64.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York. Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York
Kristen France, Specialist: An incessant inventor of fictions, Mexican-born artist Julio Galán’s art is bursting with fantasy. His compositions reveal autobiographical truths and raw personal admissions often times masked in allegory or myth. Executed in 1989, at the height of his career, Relámpagos naranjas is a beautiful example of the dark humour tinged with melancholy that pervades Galán’s works and what gained him international recognition as one of the most promising artists of the Neomexicanismo movement of the 1980s. Symbols of carnal love — a nude Venus-like figure, ripe oranges, appliquéd cherries and dildos delicately wrapped in fabric — accompany an enigmatic note: ‘Everything in life fades except for the fruits of love and grapes dressed as orange lightning bolts.’ As Galán has been known to do, he signs the painting under an invented name ‘Shas Amo’. A small opening in the painting reveals a cartoon-like cutout of a black cat, teeth bared. Amidst the layers of suggestive images and text, the viewer is left perplexed as to what to make of it all, as though caught inside some absurd erotic dreamscape of the artist’s creation. And yet, as humorously obscure as the message appears to be, Galán’s work speaks to universal truths about the corporeal essence of our existence.
Olga Albizu (1924–2005), Untitled. Oil on canvas. 36 x 25 1/2 in. (91.4 x 64.8 cm.). This work is offered in the Latin American Art sale on 20 November at Christie’s in New York.
Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York
Marysol Nieves, Specialist: I first encountered the work of Olga Albizu in the collection of the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico in San Juan and was immediately riveted by her dynamic abstractions. A fiercely independent artist with a distinct perspective, Albizu studied under the tutelage of the Spanish painter Vicente Esteban in the late 1940s at the University of Puerto Rico. But she soon sought an escape from the constraints of the local art scene and moved to New York in 1948 — the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement. She immediately enrolled at the Hans Hoffman School of Fine Arts and later at the Art Student League, where she not only absorbed the teachings of Hoffman but, by the mid-1950s, would develop her own brand of gestural abstraction based on colour-driven geometries constructed from patches of richly saturated hues as is evident in this superb example. A significant voice in the second wave of Abstract Expressionist artists, Albizu is deserving of a closer examination alongside such other luminaries from this generation as Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner.
Browse this selection and other works in our upcoming auction of Latin American Art on 20–21 November at Christie’s in New York