Sorolla before Sorolla

At the age of two, Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida was left an orphan. His parents died from cholera in the epidemic that devastated Valencia in 1865. Little Joaquín and his sister Concha were taken care of by their maternal uncles, Isabel Bastida and José Piqueres. In the mornings, the adolescent Sorolla helped his uncle, who was a master locksmith, and attended night classes at the Crafts Schools of Valencia, whose registration book contains the name of a student (Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida) and his profession (locksmith). He was 13 years old when he entered this prestigious artistic center and he stayed there from 1876 to 1879. Among his teachers, he had Cayetano Capuz, who taught sculpture, and José Estruch, a drawing teacher. Some of the drawings that an adolescent Joaquín painted there (‘Study of feet’, ‘Couple of Arabs’, ‘Immaculate Conception of the Venerables’ –copy of a Murillo– and ‘Portrait of the King of Rome’) are present in the exhibition with which his house-museum in Madrid inaugurates the commemorative acts of the centenary of his death, which, as has happened with the 50th anniversary of Picasso’s death, has been brought forward a few months. Both events will take place in 2023. Four drawings made by Sorolla at the Artisan Schools of Valencia. On the right, a youthful photograph of the artist Efe ‘Sorolla. Origins ‘addresses his formative years and his first steps as an artist, until in 1885 he achieved his dream of traveling to Rome as a pensioner. Sorolla before Sorolla, when he had not yet achieved international recognition and success. Curated by Luis Alberto Pérez Velarde, curator of the Sorolla Museum, the exhibition brings together 93 works (57 paintings, 6 drawings, a border, a watercolor, 26 photographs, a medal and a tile). Many of the paintings present are unpublished. Twenty-five come from private collections. And there are those that come out of the Sorolla Museum warehouses for the first time. The exhibition will travel, after passing through Madrid, to the Museum of Fine Arts in Valencia. After passing through the Schools of Craftsmen of Valencia, in 1878 he entered the School of Fine Arts of this city, which depended on the Royal Academy of San Carlos. He was a student of Salustiano Asenjo, Ricardo Franch, Felipe Farinós and Gonzalo Salvá Simbor. In those years he focused on flower painting and still lifes. The curator recounts that the young Sorolla earned money selling his paintings in shops where art was offered at the time: Faustino Nicolás’s stationery shop, Mr. Calvet’s shirt shop, Germán Burriel’s confectionery… The curator of the exhibition at the Museum Sorolla, next to a work by the artist, a sketch of ‘El dos de mayo’ Efe Also, in the city’s Rastro de los Santos Juanes, where the photographer Antonio García Peris acquired a still life with grapes and pomegranates. When he got home he showed it to the young apprentice in his workshop, who was none other than Joaquín Sorolla, who confessed that he was the author of the painting he had bought. The canvas, which he painted in 1878 and sold for five dollars, hangs in the first room of the exhibition. It was donated in 1919 by the heirs of Antonio García to the Museum of Fine Arts in Valencia. Over the years, his first patron became his father-in-law, as the artist would marry his daughter Clotilde. In 1881 the young Sorolla traveled to Madrid, where he copied Ribera in the Prado Museum and, above all, Velázquez, an artist who caused “a profound impact” on him, according to the curator. Some of these copies are present in the first section of the exhibition: ‘Menippus’, ‘Mars’, fragments of ‘Las hilanderas’ and ‘Portrait of Queen Mariana of Austria’, Spinola’s head from ‘Las lances’.. That year he exhibited, without success, three marinas in the capital. They had gone out of style. In the background, portraits of Joaquín Sorolla made in his formative years Efe The second section of the exhibition brings together some of Sorolla’s works that were present at the Regional Exhibition of Valencia in 1883, organized by the Royal Economic Society of Friends of the Country, where he achieved his first great success thanks to the portrait of a nun: ‘Nun in prayer’ won the Gold Medal. The table is property of the Bancaja Foundation. The Sorolla Museum keeps a photograph of the canvas with this inscription: «To my dear uncle Pepe, his nephew Joaquín. Valencia, 1883». Of the six works that he presented, four are hanging. Two have recently been acquired by the Ministry of Culture and attached to the Sorolla Museum: ‘La esclava y la paloma. Nude’ and ‘The Offeror’. They have the same measurements and were shown as a couple in 1883. The exhibition tour continues with a space focused on two of his masterpieces, both History paintings: ‘El dos de mayo’ and ‘El grito del Palleter’. Sorolla presented the first one at the National Exhibition in 1884. In the monumental canvas, like Goya did, he deals with the uprising of Madrid against the French invasion. Specifically, the defense of the Monteleón Artillery Park. He got the second medal. The commissioner recalls that Sorolla once said: “Here, to make yourself known and win medals, you have to kill people.” The painting, which was painted outdoors, was acquired by the State and passed to the collections of the Prado, which has it deposited in the Villanueva y Geltrú museum. It is not included in the sample, although there are interesting studies and sketches. ‘Still life’. Valencia, 1878. It was acquired in the Rastro de los Santos Juanes by Antonio García Peris, his future father-in-law Museo de Bellas Artes de Valencia Encouraged by the success, Sorolla presented another historical-themed work in a contest organized by the Valencia Provincial Council . The winner would get a study pension in Rome. The theme proposed by the jury was ‘The cry of the Palleter’. Sorolla unanimously obtained the long-awaited scholarship with the canvas ‘El grito del Palleter o El Palleter declarando la guerra a Napoleón’, one of the jewels of the exhibition, which has been ceded by the Valencia Provincial Council, which has it deposited in the Palace of the Generalitat. The painting narrates the anti-French harangue of Vicente Doménech, the Palleter, who sold straws impregnated with sulfur to light a fire. According to legend, he was the one who gave the cry of independence to the peasants who were near the place where the first revolutionary movement occurred. Next to the painting, a magnificent sketch of the Palleter’s face. Thanks to the scholarship, in the winter of 1885, Sorolla, who was 21 years old, traveled to Rome. MORE INFORMATION noticia Yes The Prado and the Sorolla Museum add new works by the painter on the centenary of his death noticia No The Museum of Fine Arts of Valencia programs temporary exhibitions of Sorolla and Goya in 2023 The exhibition concludes with a room focused on portraiture , a genre in which Joaquín Sorolla was a master. A gallery of portraits of relatives (his sister Concha) and friends are exhibited. This is the case of a canvas, from a private collection, in which he paints studies of eight male heads. Among them, that of the painter Francisco Pradilla, who would be his teacher in Rome. The curator warns that already in this stage of training one can appreciate some of the virtues that would characterize, years later, his celebrated painting: his mastery in the use of color, his handling of light and his ability to insert the figures in the compositions.