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Lot Essay
Caesaeta presented here, is undoubtedly a significant masterpiece from his oeuvre. Another noteworthy element is the personal provenance of the painting and the strong familial bonds that has endured since. The painting was gifted to the family of Luis Albarracin, who married Matilde Zobel, the sister of the famed artist. Zobel was even neighbours with the family, moving into an apartment on the same floor in Madrid.
Belonging to his first sustained and acclaimed body of abstract works; the Saeta series was painted in the late 1950s, and was inspired by movement. Painted early in his career in 1959, this came at a point where he abandoned figuration and moved to pure abstraction. Zobel himself once commented, "You might define the Saeta s as drawing in thin lines against a field of colours. The real technical problem involved - one that took a long time to solve - was how to draw in oil paint, a line that could be very long if necessary, as well as thin and controllable. After many experiments, I arrived at the use of glass hypodermic syringe, needle removed, filled with oil paint. The syringe is easy to handle and very sensitive to differences in angle and pressure. "
It is widely known that after visiting an exhibition by Mark Rothko in 1954, Zobel was inspired to pursue pure abstraction. However, equal significance must be mentioned of the impact Oriental arts had on him. Zobel himself admitted that the “lines painstakingly traced with the rake” in the Japanese Zen gardens of Kyoto were a fountainhead for his iconic Saeta series. Chinese calligraphy was also particularly influential on him. His deep admiration as well for its ability to capture movement and expressiveness was encapsulated and noted by Rod Paras- Perez, "These no doubt were crucial in preparing the way to his understanding of gestural
expressionism. He recalled later that, because of the paper's absorbency, Chinese calligraphy had a unique capacity to capture visually the speed with which the artist manipulated the brush. As a result, it was possible to see the pauses and rhythms, or musical meter, of such an art. Ultimately, Zobel's study of Chinese Calligraphy helped him identify the impetus for his own work, the recognition of his own hand's individual gesture and meter. Later, in the Saeta paintings, for example, there seems to be nothing Chinese about them. Rather, they are the work of an artist reaffirming his Western roots, particularly Spanish ones with all their echoes in Lorca."
In Caesaeta, we see the application of jet black paint in an expressive gestural fashion. Utilising the glass hypodermic syringe, he gained a level of precise graphic detail. Skilfully and meticulously executed, the syringe allowed him to control paint flow, pressure and the angle at which the pigment was used to create thin jet black lines in either horizontal or vertical directions, creating a latticework of lines, yet the painting is imbued with great contrast and movement. The overall execution reveals a refined sense of architectural planning. While the fine lines draw the eye in both vertical and horizontal directions, becoming quite dense in some areas, the sensation created is never one of chaos. All elements are in complete harmony: the spatial allocation of lines against the pictorial field; the careful calculation of weight and balance; the finely honed swift blurring which interrupts the clarity of line. Caesaeta reveals a beautiful synchrony between expression and technical achievement; demonstrating the years of aesthetic evolution and research by Zobel toward this eventual masterpiece.
Belonging to his first sustained and acclaimed body of abstract works; the Saeta series was painted in the late 1950s, and was inspired by movement. Painted early in his career in 1959, this came at a point where he abandoned figuration and moved to pure abstraction. Zobel himself once commented, "You might define the Saeta s as drawing in thin lines against a field of colours. The real technical problem involved - one that took a long time to solve - was how to draw in oil paint, a line that could be very long if necessary, as well as thin and controllable. After many experiments, I arrived at the use of glass hypodermic syringe, needle removed, filled with oil paint. The syringe is easy to handle and very sensitive to differences in angle and pressure. "
It is widely known that after visiting an exhibition by Mark Rothko in 1954, Zobel was inspired to pursue pure abstraction. However, equal significance must be mentioned of the impact Oriental arts had on him. Zobel himself admitted that the “lines painstakingly traced with the rake” in the Japanese Zen gardens of Kyoto were a fountainhead for his iconic Saeta series. Chinese calligraphy was also particularly influential on him. His deep admiration as well for its ability to capture movement and expressiveness was encapsulated and noted by Rod Paras- Perez, "These no doubt were crucial in preparing the way to his understanding of gestural
expressionism. He recalled later that, because of the paper's absorbency, Chinese calligraphy had a unique capacity to capture visually the speed with which the artist manipulated the brush. As a result, it was possible to see the pauses and rhythms, or musical meter, of such an art. Ultimately, Zobel's study of Chinese Calligraphy helped him identify the impetus for his own work, the recognition of his own hand's individual gesture and meter. Later, in the Saeta paintings, for example, there seems to be nothing Chinese about them. Rather, they are the work of an artist reaffirming his Western roots, particularly Spanish ones with all their echoes in Lorca."
In Caesaeta, we see the application of jet black paint in an expressive gestural fashion. Utilising the glass hypodermic syringe, he gained a level of precise graphic detail. Skilfully and meticulously executed, the syringe allowed him to control paint flow, pressure and the angle at which the pigment was used to create thin jet black lines in either horizontal or vertical directions, creating a latticework of lines, yet the painting is imbued with great contrast and movement. The overall execution reveals a refined sense of architectural planning. While the fine lines draw the eye in both vertical and horizontal directions, becoming quite dense in some areas, the sensation created is never one of chaos. All elements are in complete harmony: the spatial allocation of lines against the pictorial field; the careful calculation of weight and balance; the finely honed swift blurring which interrupts the clarity of line. Caesaeta reveals a beautiful synchrony between expression and technical achievement; demonstrating the years of aesthetic evolution and research by Zobel toward this eventual masterpiece.