Julio González

Figure with Balls, known as ‘Severe’

1938

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Not on display

Artist: Julio González 1876–1942
Original title: Personnage aux boules dit 'Sévère'
Medium: Ink, crayon and graphite on paper
Dimensions: Support: 356 × 279 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by Mme Roberta Gonzalez-Richard, the artist's niece 1972
Reference: T01615

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González used drawing as a primary way of exploring his ideas. These drawings, made over a six-year period, show how his abstract idiom was rooted in reality and, especially, in the figure. González concentrated on upright structures that, if translated into sculpture, would make use of the strength and balance available from welded iron. This group gives a sense of his inventiveness as he worked towards images with a high emotional charge.

Gallery label, August 2004

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Catalogue entry

Julio González 1876-1942

T01615 Personnage aux Boules dit 'Sévère' (Figure with Balls known as 'Severe') 1938

Inscribed '28-10-38 | J.G.' b.r.
Pen, crayon and pencil on yellow paper, 14 x 11 (35.6 x 28)
Presented by Roberta González 1972
Exh: Tři Španĕlé: Dominguez - González - De la Serna, Umĕlecká Beseda, Prague, November-December 1946 (13); Julio González, Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna, Turin, April-May 1967 (38, repr.); Julio González: Drawings and Sculpture, Museum of Modern Art, New York, touring exhibition, November 1968-January 1971 (34) as 'Standing Figure'
Lit: Josette Gibert, Julio González Dessins: Projets pour Sculptures: Personnages (Paris 1975), p.73 repr. as 'Personnage aux Boules dit "Sévère" '
Repr: Ronald Alley, The González Gift to the Tate Gallery (London 1974), p.35

Entitled by Roberta González both 'Personnage aux Boules' and 'Personnage Sévère'. There is a sketchy pencil drawing on the verso of a rather similar form.

[All the drawings by Julio González given to the Tate are authenticated on the back by his daughter Roberta González and inscribed with a title and date, or approximate date. The titles are used in the catalogue entries, but the dating has been made more precise wherever possible. (Julio González's drawings are usually dated from about 1934 onwards, but the great majority of the early drawings are undated).]

Published in:
Ronald Alley, Catalogue of the Tate Gallery's Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists, Tate Gallery and Sotheby Parke-Bernet, London 1981, p.318, reproduced p.318