With its caricature-like approach and its cold range of colours this painting provides the perfect example of the final period and aesthetics of the late Alfonso Fraile, who died at a relatively young age.
And although his earlier paintings were restricted to a highly volumetric Post-, we would however highlight the reference to Paul Klee (1879-1940) who exerted a key influence on Fraile’s work as one can see in the well-drawn contours of the figures, the lack of expressiveness of the eyes and the colour fragmentation in a single area.
In the 1960s, and coinciding with his maturity as an artist, he founded the Nuevo Espacialismo group together with José Vento (1925-2005), Ángel Medina (1924-2009) and Julio Martín-Caro (1933-1968). This movement combining figuration and non-objective art was created to counteract the power of Expressionism, abstraction and chaos as opposed to the new neo-figurative and neo-realistic trends.
Sentada a la una depicts a deformed, grotesque and comical figure. The painter focuses on the face, rendered in powerful lines that could be reminiscent of the Futurism of Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) in the distorted lines of the features simultaneously showing a frontal and profile perspective.