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Lot Essay
Ana Vázquez de Parga has kindly confrmed the authenticity of this work.
A work by Spanish Surrealist Oscar Domínguez, Les deux pirates depicts a construction as sinister as a scarecrow and as light as a kite. Stretched across an iron structure, a cloth forms the outlines of two figures, crowned by two skeletal bull masks. They stand in front of a threatening sky, as ritualistic gatekeepers, meant to scare away evil spirits, or perhaps death itself. The title – ‘Two pirates’ – and the platform on which the figures stand, jetting into infinity, suggest another dimension to the work, evoking the wild, roaming life of pirates, ravaging the sea and disseminating terror. The figures thus appear as the eerie remnants of a ghost ship, brought alive by the forceful, unforgiving winds of the sea. By evoking the mythological figure of the Minotaur, moreover, the work explores one of the recurrent themes of Domínguez’s art, which fascinated the artist for its thrilling combination of brutal force and the inevitable fate of death.
Domínguez executed Les deux pirates in 1943. At the time the artist was living in occupied Paris, while most of his Surrealist colleagues and friends had fled to New York. Despite the tragic and difficult conditions, Domínguez continued to work, joining the semi-clandestine group of La Main à Plume, which – through a series of collective publications to which Domínguez contributed – aimed at maintaining Surrealism alive under the Occupation. In 1943, the year Les deux pirates was painted, the artist was even given his first solo exhibition in Paris at Galerie Louis Carré. Les deux pirates was prominently illustrated in the small catalogue: on a full page, facing Paul Éluard’s poetic presentation. The fact that this particular work received special attention on occasion of that important exhibition suggests that Les deux pirates represented one of Domínguez's greatest achievements that year. Years later, the French poet and art critic Édouard Jaguer would also remember this painting as the most significant of the exhibition: ‘Personally, I was particularly interested in Le pirate (which was also the illustration used for the invitation), a sort of ghostly character portrayed on sailcloth, where humor, if I may say so, was blowing through the rigging’ (E. Jaguer, ‘Óscar Domínguez, Surrealism and Paris 1927-1957’, pp. 244-246, in Óscar Domínguez, surrealista, exh. cat., Madrid, 2001, p. 245).
A work by Spanish Surrealist Oscar Domínguez, Les deux pirates depicts a construction as sinister as a scarecrow and as light as a kite. Stretched across an iron structure, a cloth forms the outlines of two figures, crowned by two skeletal bull masks. They stand in front of a threatening sky, as ritualistic gatekeepers, meant to scare away evil spirits, or perhaps death itself. The title – ‘Two pirates’ – and the platform on which the figures stand, jetting into infinity, suggest another dimension to the work, evoking the wild, roaming life of pirates, ravaging the sea and disseminating terror. The figures thus appear as the eerie remnants of a ghost ship, brought alive by the forceful, unforgiving winds of the sea. By evoking the mythological figure of the Minotaur, moreover, the work explores one of the recurrent themes of Domínguez’s art, which fascinated the artist for its thrilling combination of brutal force and the inevitable fate of death.
Domínguez executed Les deux pirates in 1943. At the time the artist was living in occupied Paris, while most of his Surrealist colleagues and friends had fled to New York. Despite the tragic and difficult conditions, Domínguez continued to work, joining the semi-clandestine group of La Main à Plume, which – through a series of collective publications to which Domínguez contributed – aimed at maintaining Surrealism alive under the Occupation. In 1943, the year Les deux pirates was painted, the artist was even given his first solo exhibition in Paris at Galerie Louis Carré. Les deux pirates was prominently illustrated in the small catalogue: on a full page, facing Paul Éluard’s poetic presentation. The fact that this particular work received special attention on occasion of that important exhibition suggests that Les deux pirates represented one of Domínguez's greatest achievements that year. Years later, the French poet and art critic Édouard Jaguer would also remember this painting as the most significant of the exhibition: ‘Personally, I was particularly interested in Le pirate (which was also the illustration used for the invitation), a sort of ghostly character portrayed on sailcloth, where humor, if I may say so, was blowing through the rigging’ (E. Jaguer, ‘Óscar Domínguez, Surrealism and Paris 1927-1957’, pp. 244-246, in Óscar Domínguez, surrealista, exh. cat., Madrid, 2001, p. 245).