A powerfully gestural yet poetically meditative masterpiece, Iessona (Lot 1040) hails from Fernando Zobel’s Serie Negra or Black series and was executed in 1959 at a seminal moment in the artist’s celebrated career. In 1961, the Spanish artist born in the Philippines artist decides to settle in Madrid, having recently devoted himself completely to his artistic practice. Zobel’s magnificent composition of thin explosive strokes, tempered into soft blurred forms, delivers an analytic and cerebral expression of abstract movement and purity of form. In 2015, Zobel’s Iessona was exhibited in Abstracciones: Nueva York, París, Cuenca, México which presented a collects ion of works by the most distinguished artists of various abstract movements, such as Pierre Soulages, Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, Jean Dubuffet, Mark Rothko and Kazuo Shiraga. Fernando Zobel’s Iessona represented Zobel’s strong distinct language, that traversed artistic movements, culture, and history to arrive at its state of profound beauty.

The current work is dedicated to Guillermo Delgado, one of the first painters Zobel admired and befriended when he arrived in Madrid. Iessona represents the intimate relationship and mutual admiration between these two artists and how they informed one another’s approaches in art making.

Iessona conveys a passion structured into a fugue. The Serie Negra series was a continuation of Zobel’s search following the success of his Saeta series. Iessona is an early example of Fernando Zobel’s Serie Negra which the artist embarked upon between 1959 – 1963 as it still embodies certain elements of his Saeta works. The artist’s Saetas often champion chromatic intensity, whereas Zobel’s Serie Negra was an intentional departure from color. The artist maintained a highly restrained palette, using black paint against a white canvas, exploring movement and gesture in its purest form. In Iessona, a web of thin piercing lines explodes upon the canvas. These arrow-like lines are created by squeezing pigment swiftly across the canvas, a technique developed during Zobel’s Saeta series. Zobel then obscures these lines into subtle shades of black that reverberate across the white negative space. The vigorous gesture of the brush takes centre stage in a way that is reminiscent of Hans Hartung, Pierre Soulages and Franz Kline, yet the main impetus of the work perceived reality of movement.

Iessona signifies Zobel’s cosmopolitan identity as the artist was soon becoming a sensation not only in the Philippines, but also in Europe and the USA. In 1960, a year after the present work was executed, Zobel participated in the group exhibition Before Picasso. After Miro in New York at the renowned Solomon Guggenheim Museum. Zobel’s growing recognition as an international artist, came at t.mes when the artist also struggled on a personal level, as he juggled working in the Ayala family business in the Philippines, and the Spanish art movements that Zobel was strongly drawn to. Within the same year Iessona was painted, Zobel embarks on his goal to establish a museum devoted to abstract and modern art in Spain. After several years, Zobel and his artist friends found a suitable site in Cuenca, southeast of Madrid, and established the Museum of Abstract Spanish Art (Museo de Arte Abstracto Español) which opened on 30 June 1966.

Zobel likewise was informed by classical traditions, from Renaissance painting to ancient Chinese artefacts and Oriental calligraphy. In 1958, Zobel helped lead an archaeological dig with the National Museum of the Philippines and discovered ancient Chinese artefacts. This spurred Zobel’s interest in Oriental art and calligraphy at both an academic and creative level. Iessona exemplifies Zobel’s arrival at an abstract language that was highly expressive and informed by Chinese art. The strong black brushworks in Zobel’s Serie Negra works, are exuberant yet contemplative, highly reminiscent of Chinese calligraphy. However, unlike artists of American Abstract Expressionism who used black predominantly to create monumentally calligraphic works, Zobel’s Iessona is much more intimate – both in scale and in substance.

Embodying the emotive power of the artist’s abstract language, Iessona proclaims the tenacity and brilliance of Fernando Zobel’s practice and his standing one of the most important abstract painters of the 20^th century.

《伊索納》（拍品編號 1040）出自費南度・索培爾的「黑色」系列，展現充滿詩意的韻律及筆勢，這張傑作於1959年面世，時值藝術家事業生涯的重要時刻。這位生於菲律賓的西班牙藝術家決定長居馬德里，開始全心投入創作。伊索納以纖細筆觸交織出爆發力，線條的邊緣化作一團團柔和的黑影，呈現出一個經過理性分析、構圖嚴謹的抽象圖形，展現純粹的動勢與形式。2015年，索培爾的《伊索納》於「抽象主義：紐約、巴黎、昆卡與墨西哥」展出，該展覽雲集多場抽象主義運動的名家傑作，包括皮耶・蘇拉吉、威廉・德庫寧、羅伯特・馬瑟韋爾、尚・杜布菲、馬克・羅斯科及白髮一雄。費南度・索培爾的《伊索納》展現這位藝術家深具震撼力的獨特藝術語彙，其影響力橫跨不同藝術運動、文化領域與歷史時代，魅力雋永。《伊索納》以層層交疊的複合抽象結構，在畫面展現澎湃的力量。繼「Saeta」系列大獲成功以後，索培爾於「黑色」系列繼續他的探索過程。《伊索納》是費南度・索培爾「黑色」系列的早期作品，此系列作於1959 至 1963年，當中的畫作仍然蘊含「Saeta」系列的元素。在《伊索納》中，多條纖幼銳利的箭形線條從畫面中央噴湧而出，此乃索培爾在畫幅上快速擠壓顏料所產生的效果，體現藝術家在「Seata」系列中磨礪的作畫技巧。其後，他化開線條上的顏料，渲染出團團黑影，漫溢在畫面四周的留白空間。

此畫是索培爾獻給吉列爾莫・德爾加多（Guillermo Delgado）的傑作。本作見證兩位藝術家的深厚情誼與彼此的欣賞之情，體現二人在藝術創作上的相互影響。1960年，即本作誕生的前一年，索培爾獲邀參與紐約知名博物館所羅門・R・古根海姆美術館舉辦的「畢加索之前，米羅之後」群展，從此享譽國際。不過，當時索培爾在個人生活上面臨一大掙扎——他十分嚮往參與西班牙藝術運動，同時亦考慮在菲律賓接掌Ayala家族生意。在《伊索納》問世之年，索培爾開始為實現理想付諸實行，決定在西班牙興建一所專注收藏現代及抽象藝術的博物館。幾年後，索培爾與他的藝術家好友在馬德里東南部的昆卡物色了一個合適的地點，共同創立了西班牙抽象藝術博物館（Museo de Arte Abstracto Español）。1966年6月30日，該館正式開幕。

無獨有偶，索培爾亦深受古典藝術傳統熏陶，從文藝復興時期繪畫、到古代中國手工藝品及東方書法均有涉獵。1958年，索培爾協助菲律賓國家博物館進行考古挖掘，發現了一批中國古代文物。這次經歷激發了索培爾對東方藝術和書法在學術及創作層面上的興趣。本作可見索培爾從中國藝術中汲取靈感，創出充滿表現力的抽象語彙；他的「黑色」系列筆觸豪邁、色彩濃烈鮮明，同時充滿沉靜冥思，極具中國書法的風韻。有別於多以黑色筆觸創作巨幅書法作品的美國抽象表現藝術家，索培爾的《伊索納》在尺幅和質感上較為含蓄細膩。

本作展現費南度・索培爾抽象語彙的強大情感力量，彰顯他的藝術才華與堅毅不屈的創作精神，足證索培爾躋身作世紀最出類拔萃的抽象畫家的地位。