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Lot Essay
This work is sold with a photo-certificate from Ana Vázquez de Parga.
Muerte del Torero is a painting-cum-objet surréaliste by Oscar Domínguez that dates from 1935, one of the most important years of his career, when he was embraced by the Surreal movement which his innovative ideas and techniques would help to re-energise. Hailing from the Canaries, Domínguez provided another facet to the Spanish influx that brought so much new blood to the Surreal movement, a new generation that granted it more momentum.
That Spanish origin is clear in Muerte del Torero, with its depiction of some corrida of the mind. The picture shows a bull-horned object striking at the torero of the title, who already appears to be in a coffin being flung across the cloudscape; his arm has already become an ossified echo of the bull’s horn which appears to be doing him so much damage, implying the union between the torero and the toro, the opponents locked in a duel and a duality alike. The apotheosis of the torero is completed by the incorporation of a figurine within the body of the frame, a three-dimensional object that adds an extra layer of potency to this image, allowing it to bleed all the more into our dimension.
Domínguez had met André Breton, the great central protagonist of Surrealism, in 1934, the year before Muerte del Torero was created. Within a short time, Domínguez’ unique vision, which often introduced elements of violence such as that shown here, as well as a sexual dimension touched upon by the engraved image on the copperplate verso, had had a huge impact on the movement, as had his innovative incorporation and transformation of objects. In Muerte del Torero, Domínguez has taken advantage of his use of a copper plate as a support for this oil painting, a time-honoured technique, to add an extra spark of dynamism to the composition. He has scratched out the jagged fork of lightning, allowing the metallic gleam of the copper to shine through, and has likewise incised the point of contact between the bull’s horns and the torero, making it seem like an electric explosion, a transference of energy. The untrammelled energy of the beast, which was such a source of fascination to many of the artists involved with and in the orbit of Surrealism and which likewise came to appear in the pictures of minotaurs and the publication of the same name, was a motif that recurred in Domínguez’ own work, perhaps allowing him to channel and express his own violent side as well as his Spanish identity.
Muerte del Torero is a painting-cum-objet surréaliste by Oscar Domínguez that dates from 1935, one of the most important years of his career, when he was embraced by the Surreal movement which his innovative ideas and techniques would help to re-energise. Hailing from the Canaries, Domínguez provided another facet to the Spanish influx that brought so much new blood to the Surreal movement, a new generation that granted it more momentum.
That Spanish origin is clear in Muerte del Torero, with its depiction of some corrida of the mind. The picture shows a bull-horned object striking at the torero of the title, who already appears to be in a coffin being flung across the cloudscape; his arm has already become an ossified echo of the bull’s horn which appears to be doing him so much damage, implying the union between the torero and the toro, the opponents locked in a duel and a duality alike. The apotheosis of the torero is completed by the incorporation of a figurine within the body of the frame, a three-dimensional object that adds an extra layer of potency to this image, allowing it to bleed all the more into our dimension.
Domínguez had met André Breton, the great central protagonist of Surrealism, in 1934, the year before Muerte del Torero was created. Within a short time, Domínguez’ unique vision, which often introduced elements of violence such as that shown here, as well as a sexual dimension touched upon by the engraved image on the copperplate verso, had had a huge impact on the movement, as had his innovative incorporation and transformation of objects. In Muerte del Torero, Domínguez has taken advantage of his use of a copper plate as a support for this oil painting, a time-honoured technique, to add an extra spark of dynamism to the composition. He has scratched out the jagged fork of lightning, allowing the metallic gleam of the copper to shine through, and has likewise incised the point of contact between the bull’s horns and the torero, making it seem like an electric explosion, a transference of energy. The untrammelled energy of the beast, which was such a source of fascination to many of the artists involved with and in the orbit of Surrealism and which likewise came to appear in the pictures of minotaurs and the publication of the same name, was a motif that recurred in Domínguez’ own work, perhaps allowing him to channel and express his own violent side as well as his Spanish identity.