The Sacred Cow was part of the 1962 exhibition Rodolfo Opazo of Chile Oils and Engravings held at the Organization of American States, where he showed the work he had developed in New York while studying at the Pratt Institute. In this composition Opazo presents a monumental figure of a cow in white and beige tones on a gray background that covers almost the whole surface. The figure is amorphous and disproportionate; the size of the visible leg, for instance, does not match the rest of the animal. It is a flat figure composed of juxtaposed planes. The influence of Picasso can be appreciated in the position of the nostrils and the presentation of the animal’s profile. Without knowing whether it is dead or alive, the viewer observes only an almost inert, but erotic being. Its skin gives the impression of raw marble. However, despite its lifeless appearance, two elements suggest that it is alive: the redness of the nostrils and what seems to be the birth of a calf; that is, the red hoof peeking out horizontally to the right through a hole that goes through part of the cow. The hoof alludes to Picasso’s Guernica. Despite the references to Picasso, this is a surrealist piece that evokes death and solitude, as well as life, and its treatment of color, eroticism, and dramatism suggest the magical world of Bosch and El Greco’s Laocoön. This piece was acquired for the AMA permanent collection directly after the exhibition held in 1962, along with nine of the artist’s engravings.
Rodolfo Opazo was born in Santiago, Chile in 1935. In 1953 he studied for a year at the Escuela de Bellas Artes of the Universidad de Chile and learned engraving at Taller 99 under Nemesio Antúnez. In 1957 he received a scholarship from the Instituto de Cultura Hispánica to study in Spain, and traveled to France, Italy, and Belgium. Three years later he obtained another scholarship, this time from the Organization of American States to study at the Pratt Institute in New York. His early work shows influences of the Chilean artists Enrique Zañartur and Roberto Matta. However, over time, Opazo began to develop his own aesthetic, which would generally fall under the umbrella of French surrealism. His work is inspired by solitude, human tragedy, and the vulnerability of beings, which he depicts amorphously, without giving them a clear identity. He also takes elements from Greek mythology and reinterprets the erotic allegories of Hieronymus Bosch, the dramatic quality of Laocoön (c. 1610/1614) by El Greco, and formal elements from Picasso. His most recent work presents theatrical elements with intense colors, contrary to the pale and shrouded palette he used in the sixties. In 1970 Opazo began to teach regularly at the Faculty of Art at the Universidad de Chile, where he worked until 1993. In 1959 he received an honorable mention at the Fifth São Paulo Biennial and an acquisition award at the Dallas Museum’s South American Art Today contest. In 1960 he won an award from the Guggenheim Museum and, in addition to others, he also received Chile’s National Plastic Arts Award in 2001. His work has been shown at institutions such as the Organization of American States, the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Chile, the Museo Rayo in Colombia, and the Instituto Panameño de Arte. Some of his pieces are included in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the Dallas Museum, the Luis Ángel Arango Library, and the OAS Art Museum of the Americas, among others. In addition to his career as a painter, engraver, draftsman, and professor, Opazo designed the stage of the Ballet Moderno in Santiago.
