ROBERTO AIZENBERG | Pintura

Banco Europeo para América Latina, Buenos Aires
Galería de Arte Arroyo, Buenos Aires
Private Collection (acquired from the above) 
Christie's, New York, 17 November 2009, Lot 58
Acquired from the above by Stephen Junkunc IV 

Buenos Aires, Art Gallery International, Roberto Aizenberg, Pinturas, Esculturas y Grabados, April 1975, n.p., illustrated

Victoria Verlichak, Aizenberg, Buenos Aires 2007, p. 199, illustrated in color 

This work is painted onto a canvasboard which also has canvas applied to the reverse. The reverse has been lightly gessoed by the artist. The paint layer is clean and lightly varnished. Under ultraviolet light, one can see a retouching on the top edge in the extreme upper left corner. There are four spots of retouching in the upper right above the rectangular constructions, a retouching measuring about 1 inch horizontally at the top of the furthest-left rectangle, a group of three retouches about 3 1/2 inches from the left edge in the center of the work, and two other small spots further below. There are a couple of spots on the extreme edges, for instance in the lower left. The work is in good condition overall, and it should be hung in its current state. (This condition report has been provided courtesy of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.)
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.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

“The invitation comes from the works of art. To penetrate a world of dreams. To follow them to the limits of the day. To confine ourselves beyond our own imagination.” Matilde Herrera, Aizenberg, Buenos Aires 1990, n.p. The Argentine painter Roberto Aizenberg’s work draws the viewer into a world of architectonic purity and meditative beauty, a stark environment of geometric perfection. Born in 1928 to Russian immigrants in the rural Argentine village of Federal, Aizenberg knew from childhood that he would be a painter. After moving to the growing hub of Buenos Aires, he first studied as an architect, but returned to painting in 1950 when renowned Argentine Surrealist Juan Batlle Planas offered him mentorship. From Batlle Planas he learned the technique of automatism, as well as a deeply spiritual motivation to create and a classical rigor, all of which drove his painting throughout his life. Automatic drawing, for Aizenberg, was not just a technique to foment creativity, but rather to make contact with profound spiritual truth, and to penetrate through from superficial ideas to a universal plastic vocabulary that could speak to all humanity. As he grew as a painter throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the dual influences of Surrealism and of architecture, in particular that of the Italian Renaissance, become apparent in his fastidious paintings. He was recognized as a master by his own country in 1969 with a retrospective at the prestigious Instituto Torcuato di Tella, and his work began to gain international renown soon after, first with a solo exhibition at Galería Estudio Actual in Caracas in 1971, and later with his first solo exhibitions in Europe at Hanover Gallery in London, then at Gimpel & Hanover Gallery in Zurich in 1972 and 1973. 

Aizenberg began the present Pintura in 1971 and finished in 1975, at the height of his career and just before a coup in Argentina forced him into exile in Italy. The gleaming surface of the work, its harmonious tones of azure and turquoise and the architectural perfection of its gently vibrating vertical forms invite the viewer into a realm of spiritual tranquility and contemplation. Its introspective beauty is emblematic of Aizenberg’s aesthetic project; for him, painting was “a spiritual investigation, an ascetic exercise like a type of zen gymnastics or archery, or like the work of an alchemist in search of pure gold” (Roberto Aizenberg in Rosa M. de Brill, Aizenberg: Pintores Argentinos del Siglo XX, Buenos Aires 1980, p. 2).