- 59
盧齊歐·封塔納
估價
600,000 - 800,000 GBP
招標截止
描述
- 盧齊歐·封塔納
- 《空間概念》
- 油彩、著色玻璃畫布
- 41 x 51公分
- 16 1/8 x 20 1/8英寸
- 1956年作
來源
McRoberts & Tunnard, London
Galerie Pierre, Stockholm
Galerie Bonnier, Geneva
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner circa 1967
Galerie Pierre, Stockholm
Galerie Bonnier, Geneva
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner circa 1967
展覽
Leverkusen, Städtisches Museum, Schloss Morsbroich, Lucio Fontana, 1962, no. 32, illustrated
Minneapolis, Walker Art Center; Austin, University of Texas Art Museum, Lucio Fontana. The Spatial Concept of Art, 1966, no.11
Minneapolis, Walker Art Center; Austin, University of Texas Art Museum, Lucio Fontana. The Spatial Concept of Art, 1966, no.11
出版
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana, Catalogue raisonné des peintures et environments spatiaux, Vol. II, Brussels 1974, p. 38, no. 56 P 22, illustrated
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana, Catalogo Ragionato di Sculture, Dipinti, Ambientazioni, Vol. I, Milan 1986, p. 143, no. 56 P 22, illustrated
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana, Catalogo Ragionato di Sculture, Dipinti, Ambientazioni, Vol. I, Milan 2006, p. 284, no. 56 P 22, illustrated
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana, Catalogo Ragionato di Sculture, Dipinti, Ambientazioni, Vol. I, Milan 1986, p. 143, no. 56 P 22, illustrated
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana, Catalogo Ragionato di Sculture, Dipinti, Ambientazioni, Vol. I, Milan 2006, p. 284, no. 56 P 22, illustrated
Condition
Colour:
The colours in the catalogue illustration are fairly accurate, although the tonality of the red stones is deeper and richer in the original.
Condition:
This work is in very good condition. The top right corner tip is slighty threadbare and there is minor wear to the remaining corner tips. Very close inspection reveals a minute repaired tear to the canvas towards the centre of the top right quadrant, a further small repaired tear to the centre of the bottom edge and one just above, which fluorescese under ultraviolet light.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."
拍品資料及來源
Concetto Spaziale belongs to Lucio Fontana’s illustrious pietre (or ‘stones’) series, produced between 1951-2 and 1958, and named for their gem-like elements of Murano glass affixed to the canvas. Executed at the height of Fontana’s concentration upon the pietre series in 1955, the present work boasts two abstracted archipelagos of rich amethystine purple and pure uncoloured stones, respectively, alongside a rippling line of buchi (or ‘holes’). Possessing a prestigious exhibition history, and masterfully articulating Fontana’s ground-breaking theory of Spatialism – the pursuit of a modern art encompassing all four dimensions of space – Concetto Spaziale epitomises the timeless elegance that Fontana ineffably imparted upon his highly radical and avant-garde works.
Concetto Spaziale was impressively included in the historic 1966 exhibition Lucio Fontana: The Spatial Concept of Art, held at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, and later travelling to the University of Texas Art Museum in Austin, which was crucially Fontana’s first retrospective at a public American art museum. Curatorially devoted to Fontana’s conceptual advances, the exhibition was confined to the Spatialist period with “its perforations, incisions, and lacerations (Fontana’s three ‘Spatialist’ gestures) programatically presented” (Jan van der Marck, Lucio Fontana, Walker Art Center Website, 2005, available online). Spanning eighty works, this ambitious staging included strong examples from the Fine di Dio, Teatrini, Venezie, and Natura series, alongside the present work. Whereas throughout the early 1960s Fontana had become a mainstay of American and international group exhibitions on Italian and contemporary avant-garde art, and moreover was represented in the permanent collection of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the artist had yet to receive the unmitigated institutional recognition conferred by an American museum retrospective. Concetto Spaziale thus belongs to an important moment in the history of Fontana’s emerging renown, which heralded his status as a defining protagonist of post-war European art.
As illustrated by Concetto Spaziale, Fontana frequently preferred to leave his finished canvases unpainted, producing examples across a variety of series including the buchi, pietre, and tagli. Scholar Pia Gottschaler, who has studied Fontana’s materials in significant depth, believes that Fontana applied a very thin layer of polymer solution to the surface of these pietre, providing an “overall tonal unity” (Pia Gottschaler, Lucio Fontana: The Artist and His Materials, Los Angeles 2012, p.42). The present work possesses such a near-imperceptible and fine coating, which preserves the rich earth tones of the linen canvas while mediating between its roughest fibres. Throughout, the stability that Fontana achieved between the liberal glass fragments and tensely pulled canvas evinces his physical mastery over the materials – often experimental – involved in his facture. Fontana recognised that pioneering novel practices was crucial to generating an updated art with contemporary resonance. In 1953, Fontana had written: “I can’t conceive of a new art being made with traditional means, canvases, colours, and sculptures – we can use these means in a transitional way, in order to prepare us for a new aesthetic, but we will achieve a real transformation only if we enter into the dominion of modern techniques” (the artist quoted in: Ibid., p.42).
The pietre series followed naturally from Fontana’s earlier use of lustrini, tiny particles of glitter which appear in certain buchi. Both represent a Spatialist attempt to activate the surface of the canvas, piercing its two-dimensional plane with the unpredictable interplay of light and shadow. Light and beauty were inextricably intertwined for Fontana, and the pietre justly reflect his great admiration for the illuminating gems set within the Byzantine Pala d’Oro housed in the Basilica di San Marco in Venice. In keeping with Fontana’s radically modern sensibility, however, Concetto Spaziale does not evince an ordered and symmetrical placement of polished jewels in Byzantine fashion. Instead, its stones are jagged and randomly-hewn, their unpredictable arcs and curvatures clearly the product of a violent collision; their scattered forms mimicking the natural distribution of meteors in the night sky or sinuous mountain ranges. Fontana often smashed the Murano glass pieces into smaller fragments using a hammer. No mere ornamentation, the stones thus function as indexes of the force and aggression characterising modernity. Concetto Spaziale testifies to Fontana’s careful selection and arrangement of these elements, which artfully coalesce into two distinct and angular forms. Beautifully wrought in crystal and deep mulberry purple, the pietre of the present work harmoniously compliment the textured linen canvas and punctured buchi, announcing Concetto Spaziale not as a traditional painting, but as belonging to a new class of rarefied Spatial object.
Concetto Spaziale was impressively included in the historic 1966 exhibition Lucio Fontana: The Spatial Concept of Art, held at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, and later travelling to the University of Texas Art Museum in Austin, which was crucially Fontana’s first retrospective at a public American art museum. Curatorially devoted to Fontana’s conceptual advances, the exhibition was confined to the Spatialist period with “its perforations, incisions, and lacerations (Fontana’s three ‘Spatialist’ gestures) programatically presented” (Jan van der Marck, Lucio Fontana, Walker Art Center Website, 2005, available online). Spanning eighty works, this ambitious staging included strong examples from the Fine di Dio, Teatrini, Venezie, and Natura series, alongside the present work. Whereas throughout the early 1960s Fontana had become a mainstay of American and international group exhibitions on Italian and contemporary avant-garde art, and moreover was represented in the permanent collection of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the artist had yet to receive the unmitigated institutional recognition conferred by an American museum retrospective. Concetto Spaziale thus belongs to an important moment in the history of Fontana’s emerging renown, which heralded his status as a defining protagonist of post-war European art.
As illustrated by Concetto Spaziale, Fontana frequently preferred to leave his finished canvases unpainted, producing examples across a variety of series including the buchi, pietre, and tagli. Scholar Pia Gottschaler, who has studied Fontana’s materials in significant depth, believes that Fontana applied a very thin layer of polymer solution to the surface of these pietre, providing an “overall tonal unity” (Pia Gottschaler, Lucio Fontana: The Artist and His Materials, Los Angeles 2012, p.42). The present work possesses such a near-imperceptible and fine coating, which preserves the rich earth tones of the linen canvas while mediating between its roughest fibres. Throughout, the stability that Fontana achieved between the liberal glass fragments and tensely pulled canvas evinces his physical mastery over the materials – often experimental – involved in his facture. Fontana recognised that pioneering novel practices was crucial to generating an updated art with contemporary resonance. In 1953, Fontana had written: “I can’t conceive of a new art being made with traditional means, canvases, colours, and sculptures – we can use these means in a transitional way, in order to prepare us for a new aesthetic, but we will achieve a real transformation only if we enter into the dominion of modern techniques” (the artist quoted in: Ibid., p.42).
The pietre series followed naturally from Fontana’s earlier use of lustrini, tiny particles of glitter which appear in certain buchi. Both represent a Spatialist attempt to activate the surface of the canvas, piercing its two-dimensional plane with the unpredictable interplay of light and shadow. Light and beauty were inextricably intertwined for Fontana, and the pietre justly reflect his great admiration for the illuminating gems set within the Byzantine Pala d’Oro housed in the Basilica di San Marco in Venice. In keeping with Fontana’s radically modern sensibility, however, Concetto Spaziale does not evince an ordered and symmetrical placement of polished jewels in Byzantine fashion. Instead, its stones are jagged and randomly-hewn, their unpredictable arcs and curvatures clearly the product of a violent collision; their scattered forms mimicking the natural distribution of meteors in the night sky or sinuous mountain ranges. Fontana often smashed the Murano glass pieces into smaller fragments using a hammer. No mere ornamentation, the stones thus function as indexes of the force and aggression characterising modernity. Concetto Spaziale testifies to Fontana’s careful selection and arrangement of these elements, which artfully coalesce into two distinct and angular forms. Beautifully wrought in crystal and deep mulberry purple, the pietre of the present work harmoniously compliment the textured linen canvas and punctured buchi, announcing Concetto Spaziale not as a traditional painting, but as belonging to a new class of rarefied Spatial object.