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The value of artists is fixed in the collective memory over time and, for this, the various activities that transmit the memory and appreciation of artists who are no longer alive, but whose works are, are of great importance.
In this recently begun 2023, after the memory of Pablo Picasso, already underway, coinciding with the fiftieth anniversary of his death, the work of another of our great artists: Joaquín Sorolla (1863-1923), which will take place throughout 2023 and 2024, in this case for the centenary of his death.
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Sorolla. originsas indicated, attempts to reveal a “Sorolla before Sorolla”, presenting a set of works mostly unknown to the public. The exhibition is divided into four sections: “Between Valencia and Madrid”, “The Regional Exhibition of 1883”, “The grand prizes” and “The art of portraiture”.
'Sorolla.Origenes' presents a set of works mostly unknown to the public
In it, 93 works were collected: 67 paintings, 26 documentary photographs, 6 drawings and other documentary pieces. The purpose and objective are fully defined: it is about going through the beginnings that led Sorolla to configure and develop his artistic approaches.
What we are seeing places us in the field of how difficult it is to move forward until we fully consolidate life in artistic work. In the case of Sorolla, always on the horizon of painting, the beginnings can be placed in 1878-1879with his training at the Craftsmen's Schools, where he studied drawing, and at the Real Academia de Belas Artes de São Carlos, while alongside classes he worked in his uncle José's ceramics workshop, all in his native Valencia.
[The dark reverse of Joaquín Sorolla]
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Between 1879 and 1881 he participated in several exhibitions in Valencia. In 1881 he traveled to Madrid for the first time.and from then until 1883 he studied intensely at the Museo del Prado the works of Velázquez, of which he made some copies, and also of Ribera.
His participation in Valencia in the 1883 Regional Exhibition and months later in Madrid in the 1884 National Exhibition marked his consolidation in the Spanish artistic scene, already with the creation of large format paintings for which he obtains distinctions and prizes.
'The cry of the Palleter' or 'The Palleter declaring war on Napoleon', 1884. Diputación de Valencia
In 1884 he obtained a pension from the Diputación de Valencia go study in Romewhere he was able to expand his knowledge and contact with the classics.
This entire flow, complex and full of determining factors of what would become the mature Sorolla, is what the exhibition transmits to us with good criteria of organization and exhibition assembly.
The exhibition is like a portal that, when opened, takes us to the great painter Sorolla
Two paintings from 1884 allow us to see his interest in the dramatic events of the clashes with Napoleonic France in the War of Independence. One of them, second of mayIt is in the Prado Museum, but here we can see an intense and already very complete sketch.
the other photo, The Pallet Man's Screamit allows us to see a farmer who sold straw, a true historical figure who played an important role in the war.
[This Sorolla has not been seen in 50 years]
The accumulation of numbers in both cases transmits the plastic intensity with which Sorolla was able to represent, even then, the faces, bodies and modulations of human beings.
Along with several variants, some still lifes, representations of male and female nudesin certain cases associated with mythological themes, as well as some seascapes, landscapes and portraits in which we already see some of the central themes of mature Sorolla.
'The offerer. Male nude', 1883. Museo Sorolla
Particularly relevant is the painting My friends (1884), considered as a set of studies on ocho male heads, which probably served as its models for historical paintings, and which is impressive for its expressive strength.
[Sorolla, the failure that opened a new path]
Ultimately, Sorolla. origins It's like a portal that, when opened, takes us to what would become the great painter Sorolla, one of the most relevant in the transition between the 19th and 20th centurieswith his mastery of light, maritime images and portraits as axes.
Detail from 'The Painter at Work', 1905. Photograph by Christian Franzen. Sorolla Museum
Twelve months for a painter
The year dedicated to the so-called painter of light has already begun. The first exhibition is this one that recalls the origins of who would later be the portraitist of the elites. And following this line, the Ministry of Culture, which has just announced the creation of the National Commission for the celebrations of Joaquín Sorolla's centenary, acquired the paintings last December At the inn, The slave and the dove. Naked It is The offererbelonging to the artist's formative period, for €357,000.
In Barcelona, the newly opened Palau Martorell shows until March Sorolla. hunting impressions, curated by Blanca Pons-Sorolla and María López, with 193 small-format oil paintings. The immersive Royal Palace will come soon (February 17), Sorolla through the light; in April, the curatorship of Valencian writer Manuel Vicent at the Sorolla Museum; and, in June, organized by the Masaveu Peterson Foundation and the Valencia Museum of Fine Arts.
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