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T he Rafael Valls Sale comprises 100 paintings amassed by esteemed art dealer Rafael Valls over his nearly four-decade career. The group of works features exceptional examples from most major schools of painting in Western Europe dating from the 16th to the 20th centuries, with works carefully selected for their intriguing themes and quality. The eclectic group includes a variety of genres from portraits and still lifes, to trompe l’œils, landscapes and portraits, reflecting the discerning eye for which Valls is known. With prices ranging from less than £1,000 to £30,000 this is the perfect opportunity for both new and established buyers to discover the virtues of collecting.
Still Lifes
Still life paintings depict predominantly inanimate objects, such as flowers, fruit and vegetables, fish and game, and drinking and smoking paraphernalia. Still lifes can be a celebration of material pleasures, or often a warning of the ephemerality of these pleasures and of the brevity of human life, such as in ‘vanitas’ still lifes.
Landscapes
Traditionally, landscapes were confined to the background of portraits or paintings dealing principally with religious, mythological or historical subjects. Throughout the 16th and 17th centuries however, landscape painting became an increasingly popular genre in itself. In the Netherlands, the rising Protestant middle class sought secular art for their homes, creating the need for new subjects to meet their tastes, with landscapes becoming the prevalent choice. Within the broad genre of landscape, two principal types developed – one closer to the Italianate visual tradition of artists such as Nicolas Poussin, highly stylised and evocative of the landscapes of classical antiquity; the other more topographical and concerned with depicting specific locations.
Trompe l'œils
Trompe l’œil is French for ‘to deceive the eye’, an art historical tradition originating in ancient Greece in which the artist uses realistic imagery to create optical illusions and fool the viewer into thinking that the depicted objects before them exist in three dimensions. Showcasing their virtuoso skill and technical mastery at evoking different textures and creating convincing visual illusions, the artists producing these entertaining works encourage us to question the boundary between the painted world and ours.
Portraits
Prior to the invention of photography in the early 1800s, paintings were one of the few ways to record the appearance of individuals. But portraits have always been more than just a record – they have been used to show the power, importance, virtue, beauty, wealth, taste, learning or other qualities of the sitter.
Genre Paintings
Genre paintings depict aspects of everyday life by portraying people engaged in common activities, and is a type of painting that developed particularly in Holland in the 17th century. The most typical subjects were scenes of peasant life such as drinking in taverns or selling goods at markets, and tended to be small in scale.
