Communication with the purpose of culturally promoting artists included in the Fundación María Cristina Masaveu Peterson Collection, works protected by intellectual property rights. Their total or partial reproduction or processing by any means, or their transmission or cession in any form is forbidden without the authorisation of the holder of the rights to the works.
SIN TÍTULO
TECHNICAL DATA
Author: José Guerrero (Granada, 1914–Barcelona, 1991)
Title: Sin título
Year: 1961
Technique: oil on canvas
Size: 102 x 112.5 cm
Like Burning Red, also present in the Fundación María Cristina Masaveu Peterson Collection, this painting highlights the importance of black in José Guerrero’s output, a colour to which he attached an autobiographical significance associated with his native Andalusia, Granada nights and the dyed clothing of his childhood due to a death in the family. In the case of this composition, black underlies and absorbs all the other colours with an almost centripetal force. The work is executed with the strong brushwork that is characteristic of action painting, denoting how Guerrero ultimately followed the advice he had received during his formative years from his teacher Vázquez Díaz, who told him he should paint as if wielding an axe.
Originally held in a private collection in New England, United States, the painting subsequently passed to the Schiller & Bodo Gallery in New York and then to another private collection. The Foundation purchased it at Subastas Durán, Madrid, on 26 November 2020 (Lot 169).