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拍品專文
A well known caricaturist who contributed his works to the Vanity Fair magazine from 1924 till 1936 when the magazine ceased publication, Miguel Covarrubias is by training, always strive to tell the most with the simplest composition. The painting and drawing of Covarrubias are often deceptively simplistic with his emphasis of line and uncomplicated composition but nevertheless evocative and enigmatic.
The present painting depicts the sitter, nude, back facing the onlooker, with her hands raised over her shoulders, fondling her thick, dark hair. Not portraying her face, the artist instead chooses to focus on her soft, honey-hued skin and places her against a rich ornamental background of roots and stems of trees which, is so tightly arranged on a flattened surface that is reminiscent of an intricately patterned fabric, or perhaps an elaborated frame that frames the sensual beauty of the sitter. The sensuousness of the sitter is not overtly portrayed, but subtly suggested with her soft skin, the arc of her posture, the swell of the buttocks, the curves of her legs and the partial revealing of her right breast.
The portrayal of the sitter is very similar to a celebrated work of the artist, Balinesa Colgando Tela which could be literally translated as Balinese holding up a piece of cloth. With Balinesa Colgando Tela, Covarrubias also portrays his sitter in full nude, with a side profile that reveals her face more than the present work, and also set the Balinese beauty against a background of foliage. Comparing the two works, one notes the subtle stylistic variation: the Balinese is depicted with an angular, graphic touch while the bather in the present work is with a smooth and aqueous feel.
The background, on the other hand, shares a similar treatment with Covurrbias' other work - Aves del Paraiso (Birds of Paradise) as the decorative elements of both works are striking. Although The bather does not have the use of strong hues, the arranged pattern of the roots of the trees is almost identical in its intricacy. Both reveals the inherent qualities of the works of Coverrubias which are the shape, the form and the clearly outlined.
Adopting a constrained palette, The bather thrives on a series of carefully articulated contrasts. In purely formal terms, the work constitute a balance of opposing elements: straight body versus curved legs, soft skin and hair versus hard roots and stem, simplicity of the foreground versus the intricate background, flat versus rounded, vertical versus horizontal and so on. This opposition of component elements is not merely a play of formal means, but a visual expression of potent thematic tensions which like many of his works evoke a curious sense of drama with fantastic and almost dreamlike quality.
The present painting depicts the sitter, nude, back facing the onlooker, with her hands raised over her shoulders, fondling her thick, dark hair. Not portraying her face, the artist instead chooses to focus on her soft, honey-hued skin and places her against a rich ornamental background of roots and stems of trees which, is so tightly arranged on a flattened surface that is reminiscent of an intricately patterned fabric, or perhaps an elaborated frame that frames the sensual beauty of the sitter. The sensuousness of the sitter is not overtly portrayed, but subtly suggested with her soft skin, the arc of her posture, the swell of the buttocks, the curves of her legs and the partial revealing of her right breast.
The portrayal of the sitter is very similar to a celebrated work of the artist, Balinesa Colgando Tela which could be literally translated as Balinese holding up a piece of cloth. With Balinesa Colgando Tela, Covarrubias also portrays his sitter in full nude, with a side profile that reveals her face more than the present work, and also set the Balinese beauty against a background of foliage. Comparing the two works, one notes the subtle stylistic variation: the Balinese is depicted with an angular, graphic touch while the bather in the present work is with a smooth and aqueous feel.
The background, on the other hand, shares a similar treatment with Covurrbias' other work - Aves del Paraiso (Birds of Paradise) as the decorative elements of both works are striking. Although The bather does not have the use of strong hues, the arranged pattern of the roots of the trees is almost identical in its intricacy. Both reveals the inherent qualities of the works of Coverrubias which are the shape, the form and the clearly outlined.
Adopting a constrained palette, The bather thrives on a series of carefully articulated contrasts. In purely formal terms, the work constitute a balance of opposing elements: straight body versus curved legs, soft skin and hair versus hard roots and stem, simplicity of the foreground versus the intricate background, flat versus rounded, vertical versus horizontal and so on. This opposition of component elements is not merely a play of formal means, but a visual expression of potent thematic tensions which like many of his works evoke a curious sense of drama with fantastic and almost dreamlike quality.