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Lot Essay
‘Sculpture is a function of space. I don’t mean the space outside the form, which surrounds the volume and in which the form lives, but the space generated by the form, which lives within it and which is more effective the more unnoticeably it acts. You could compare it to the breath that swells and contracts forms, that opens up their space - inaccessible to and hidden from the outside world - to view. I do not see it as something abstract, but as a reality as solid as the volume that envelops it’ (E. Chillida, quoted in I. Busch (ed.), ‘Eduardo Chillida, Architect of the Void: On the Synthesis of Architecture and Sculpture’, Chillida 1948-1998, exh. cat., Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, 1998, p. 66).
Executed in 1999, Mural G-338 is a large and comparatively rare clay example of Eduardo Chillida’s work. A progressive sequence of ideogram-like images is stained with a black copper oxide into hard-baked ‘tierra chamota’ clay tiles. With a dark square at its centre, out of which radiate a series of meandering lines, Chillida traces a path to the centre of the work, in the same way that his chiselled penetrations of the clay block question the nature of its solidity. The lines recall the steel fingers of his celebrated Peines del Viento, which probe space from their position on the cliffs of San Sebastián. In this way, the open form with its lattice network of black lines, the pictogram breathes a sense of lightness or air and resuscitates the flat solid wall of clay tiles. This work is one of relatively few murals by Chillida to have been created during his lifetime, and was included in the Figur/Skulptur exhibition at the Essl Museum, 2005-2006.
In Mural G-338, the inert regularity of a wall of bricks has seemingly been given lyrical sculptural form in such a way that the effect has been encouraged to seep into these earthy blocks like an energising calligraphy. It breathes dynamic life into the inert solid material heart of the rectangular form. In staining rather than painting the work, Chillida seems to add nothing but a penetrating sense of depth and volume to the flat surface of the clay while also maintaining the integrity of his material. Moreover, its need to withstand and resist the primal element of fire, completely fascinated Chillida. In his clay sculptures he sought to probe into the nature of the material by ‘questioning the block’ as he put it. All Chillida’s art was a questioning of the nature of reality around him. His work was in many ways a scientific investigation into the communion among material, space and time. As Octavio Paz, this enquiry ‘evokes a sort of qualitative physics recalling that of the pre-Socratic philosophers’ (E. Chillida, quoted in Eduardo Chillida, exh. cat., Venice Biennale, Venice, 1990, p. 15)
Chillida’s work in clay usually took the form of strongly threedimensional sculptures made in blocks. The solidity and mystery of the clay block forms the central aspect of all Chillida’s work in this medium. In contrast to his clay sculpture however, here the solid and empty space continue to play out Chillida’s enquiry of space and the void on a two dimensional surface. His aim, was to infuse the profound depths of this dense mass of solid material with the airy lightness of space. ‘Space?’ Chillida once observed, ‘Sculpture is a function of space. I don’t mean the space outside the form, which surrounds the volume and in which the form lives, but the space generated by the form, which lives within it and which is more effective the more unnoticeably it acts. You could compare it to the breath that swells and contracts forms, that opens up their space - inaccessible to and hidden from the outside world - to view. I do not see it as something abstract, but as a reality as solid as the volume that envelops it.’ (E. Chillida, quoted in I. Busch (ed.), ‘Eduardo Chillida, Architect of the Void: On the Synthesis of Architecture and Sculpture’, Chillida 1948- 1998, exh. cat., Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, 1998, p. 66).
Executed in 1999, Mural G-338 is a large and comparatively rare clay example of Eduardo Chillida’s work. A progressive sequence of ideogram-like images is stained with a black copper oxide into hard-baked ‘tierra chamota’ clay tiles. With a dark square at its centre, out of which radiate a series of meandering lines, Chillida traces a path to the centre of the work, in the same way that his chiselled penetrations of the clay block question the nature of its solidity. The lines recall the steel fingers of his celebrated Peines del Viento, which probe space from their position on the cliffs of San Sebastián. In this way, the open form with its lattice network of black lines, the pictogram breathes a sense of lightness or air and resuscitates the flat solid wall of clay tiles. This work is one of relatively few murals by Chillida to have been created during his lifetime, and was included in the Figur/Skulptur exhibition at the Essl Museum, 2005-2006.
In Mural G-338, the inert regularity of a wall of bricks has seemingly been given lyrical sculptural form in such a way that the effect has been encouraged to seep into these earthy blocks like an energising calligraphy. It breathes dynamic life into the inert solid material heart of the rectangular form. In staining rather than painting the work, Chillida seems to add nothing but a penetrating sense of depth and volume to the flat surface of the clay while also maintaining the integrity of his material. Moreover, its need to withstand and resist the primal element of fire, completely fascinated Chillida. In his clay sculptures he sought to probe into the nature of the material by ‘questioning the block’ as he put it. All Chillida’s art was a questioning of the nature of reality around him. His work was in many ways a scientific investigation into the communion among material, space and time. As Octavio Paz, this enquiry ‘evokes a sort of qualitative physics recalling that of the pre-Socratic philosophers’ (E. Chillida, quoted in Eduardo Chillida, exh. cat., Venice Biennale, Venice, 1990, p. 15)
Chillida’s work in clay usually took the form of strongly threedimensional sculptures made in blocks. The solidity and mystery of the clay block forms the central aspect of all Chillida’s work in this medium. In contrast to his clay sculpture however, here the solid and empty space continue to play out Chillida’s enquiry of space and the void on a two dimensional surface. His aim, was to infuse the profound depths of this dense mass of solid material with the airy lightness of space. ‘Space?’ Chillida once observed, ‘Sculpture is a function of space. I don’t mean the space outside the form, which surrounds the volume and in which the form lives, but the space generated by the form, which lives within it and which is more effective the more unnoticeably it acts. You could compare it to the breath that swells and contracts forms, that opens up their space - inaccessible to and hidden from the outside world - to view. I do not see it as something abstract, but as a reality as solid as the volume that envelops it.’ (E. Chillida, quoted in I. Busch (ed.), ‘Eduardo Chillida, Architect of the Void: On the Synthesis of Architecture and Sculpture’, Chillida 1948- 1998, exh. cat., Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, 1998, p. 66).