3449 - FERNANDO BOTERO

FERNANDO BOTERO (Medellín 1932–2023 Monaco) Laúd negro. 1958. Oil on canvas. Signed lower right: Botero. Verso titled and dated: "LAUD NEGRO" 1958. 109 × 190.5 cm. Certificate: Fernando Botero (artist’s certificate). Provenance: - Artist’s studio. - Private collection, Netherlands, acquired directly from the artist in the 1960s. - Private collection, Switzerland, inherited in 2016. Exhibited: Baden-Baden/Berlin/Düsseldorf/Hamburg/Bielefeld 1970, Fernando Botero. Bilder 1962–1969, Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, 20 March–3 May 1970/Haus am Waldsee, 25 May–5 July 1970/Städtische Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, 23 July–23 August 1970/Kunstverein Hamburg, 29 August–27 September 1970/Kunsthalle Bielefeld, 11 October–22 November 1970, cat. p. 86, no. 4 (ill.). Our thanks to Fernando Botero Zea for the verbal confirmation of authenticity of the work, Mexico, 15.9.2026. The Colombian artist Fernando Botero developed a distinctive style characterised by voluminous figures, simplified forms and a particular spatial presence. During his stays in Europe, he engaged intensively with Italian Renaissance art and the works of the Old Masters. He combined these influences with subjects from everyday Colombian life and Latin American culture to forge an independent style, combining humour with perceptive observation of human nature. Botero painted the early work ‘Laúd negro’ in 1958, when he was just 26 years old. At this time he was still searching for his own artistic style. Nevertheless, the first signs of his later characteristic visual language are already apparent. The monumental still life is dominated by its large, dark areas of colour and voluminous forms, which lend the composition a pronounced sense of weight. A black laúd lying horizontally occupies the centre of the painting. Its rounded, curved body forms the composition's focal point. Several sweeping lines follow the instrument's curves, dividing the dark surface into differentiated shades of grey and black. The brown neck extends to the left towards the pegbox. Beneath it lies an open sheet of music, its suggested lines of notation standing out. Below the laúd is a clarinet, its metal details picked out by small pale and reddish accents. The right half of the painting is dominated by a large jug in ochre, rust brown and muted yellow. Behind it, its shadow forms a broad, almost black area. Above the objects runs a horizontal cream-coloured section of wall, creating a contrast to the dark passages. Strong violet and blue tones emerge at the lateral edges. These areas of colour structure the pictorial space without giving it much depth. Instead, a flat, stage-like arrangement emerges, in which the objects lie close together and appear tangible. This is where the art-historical significance of ‘Laúd negro’ lies. Botero engages with the European still-life tradition. His interest in rounded forms, balanced proportions and compositional order is already evident. At the same time, he experiments with the interplay of surface, colour and form. The painting comes from an important phase in his artistic development, in which the emphasis on volume that would characterise his later work is already emerging.