(Rosario di Santa Fe, Argentina 1899–1968 Comabbio)
Concetto Spaziale, Attesa, 1967/1968, signed, titled and inscribed on the reverse: l. Fontana/Concetto Spaziale/ATTESA/Ventimilaqua/trocentoventi/cinque e 30 cm, waterpaint on canvas, blue, 46 x 55 cm, in plexiglas box

Watch the video with our expert Patricia Pálffy

The work has been registered by the Fondazione Lucio Fontana, Milan under the archive no.2767/1.

Provenance:
Galerie Pierre, Stockholm
Private Collection, Saltsjo-Duvnas
Sotheby’s London, 20 March 1997, lot 29
Private Collection, Germany
Dorotheum, 1 June 2016, Lot 603
acquired from the above by the present owner

Exhibited:
Frankfurt am Main, Lucio Fontana, Retrospektive, Schirn Kunsthalle, 6 June - 1 September 1996 (exhibition poster)
Vienna, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, 25 September 1996 – 5 January 1997, exh. cat. pages 197, 222, no. 155, ill.
Villingen-Schwenningen, Der unbekannte Fontana, Städtische Galerie, 18 October 2003 – 11 January 2004, travel exhibition to Heidenheim, Kunstmuseum Heidenheim, Hermann Voith Galerie, 25 January - 14 March 2004
Burgdorf, Museum Franz Gertsch, 3 April - 6 June 2004, exh. cat. pages 134, 149, ill., plate 86

Literature:
Enrico Crispolti, Lucio Fontana, Catalogo ragionato di sculture, dipinti, ambientazioni, Skira, Geneva-Milan, 2006, vol. II, p. 871, no. 67 T 139 with ill. (with different dimensions and a different inscription on the reverse)

In his quest for a new spacial art form that overcomes the limitations of the two-dimensional canvas, Fontana proves to be one of the most experimental and innovative artists of the 20th century – and one that has since then formed and inspired younger generations of artists. Fontana creates the first perforated canvases in 1949; about a decade later he takes to slashing them: brutal incisions applied to mostly monochrome canvases with a sharp knife.

Fontana’s brilliant move aims to unite real space with imagined space. His incisions are intuitive and precise like a surgical procedure, characterized by the swiftness and finesse with which they were applied. Prior to the incision, the surface was empty, unmarked space, the immaculacy of which is merely amplified by the audaciousness of the cut.

He transforms the surface to a new spacial state by penetrating the very structure of the closed space. The penetration of the surface makes the fabric, the physical exterior of the canvas, sensuously cognizable, while the light dives into the crevice and disappears to open a new space underneath the surface, challenging the imagination of the viewer.

Initially, Fontana mostly applied incisions orthogonally and in a rather rhythmic order. In the present work from 1967/1968, the technique has been reduced to one vertical slash through the central axis of a quadratic canvas.

The luminous color tone – a vivid blue –shows a strinking parallel to Yves Klein’s Blue Monochromes from the 1960s with their similar quest for a new definition of color and space.

I have invented a formula I think I can not perfect. I succeed in giving those looking at my work a sense of spatial calm, of cosmic rigor of serenity with regard to the infinite. Further than this I could not go.
Lucio Fontana