Thursday 26 July 2012

Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida, María Figuero, the girl, dressed as a Menina, 1901



From the Museo del Prado:
A full-length portrait of nine-year-old María Figueroa, the daughter of Rodrigo Figueroa y Torres, Duke of Tovar and friend of the artist.
She appears here dressed like a seventeenth-century menina. The mark of Velasquez is visible not only in the subject matter but also in the Sorolla’s palette based on reds, ochres, whites and silvers, which is thus quite similar to that used by Velasquez in his finest female portraits. The rendering of the image, however, is absolutely modern and unusual for the period, with free and highly plastic brushstrokes that sometimes leave the canvas’s priming uncovered and visible to the eye, due to the abundant use of solvent in the brush.

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