Fernando Zóbel

FERNANDO ZÓBEL DE AYALA Y MONTOJO (Manila, Philippines, 1924 - Rome, Italy, 1984).
"Orilla XV".1981.
Silkscreen on paper. Copy 304/460.
Signed and justified in pencil.
Publisher: Museum of Abstract Art of Cuenca.
Bibliography: Rafael Pérez-Madero, "Zóbel. Obra Gráfica completa", Diputación Provincial de Cuenca 1999, nº 198. P. 221
It presents lack of polychrome in the frame.
Measurements: 90 x 68,5 cm; 92 x 72 cm (frame).

Fernando Zóbel is one of the most outstanding painters of the Spanish 20th century. The formation and cultivation of his personality, never ceases to develop, emphasizing his love for books. He studied Medicine in the Philippines and graduated in Philosophy and Arts at Harvard University in the United States, being at this time when he began to be interested and involved with the pictorial world influenced by the Boston School, whose palette showed almost pure colors framed by a very marked drawing. Thus, in 1951 he took up the chair of Fine Arts at the Ateneo de Manila. Zóbel's evolution and need to develop a personal artistic language led him to explore the world of abstraction influenced by Rothko, or the expressionism of Pollock or de Kooning, working on very valid non-figurative proposals. To this, it is necessary to add the great influence and interest he felt towards oriental cultures, increasing this eagerness with his participation in a Chinese archaeological excavation discovered in the Philippine peninsula of Calatagan. As it was said, Zóbel's work drinks from the East, so much so that the oriental calligraphy is the one that favors the presence of sinuous lines of great elegance, which can be appreciated in the work that concerns us, in which the meticulous and thoughtful previous work can be appreciated. And there is nothing left to chance in his apparently spontaneous painting, all of them contain a period of reflection and previous execution, because, as he said: "my process is the process of sketch, drawing, sketch and painting", a planning that gives rise to perfect scenographies formed by movement, lines, speed, space and light. His work is represented in important museums such as the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Español in Valladolid, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, the Museo de Bellas Artes in Bilbao, the Brooklyn Museum of Art in New York, the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha (Nebraska), the Hispanic Society of America, as well as in collections such as Chase Manhattan Bank, the AENA Art Collection of Contemporary Art in Madrid, as well as the Banco Urquijo in Barcelona.