JOAQUÍN SOROLLA | Escena Valenciana (Valencian Fiesta)

Private collection (acquired directly from the artist in 1896)
Juan March Ordinas (1880-1962), Palma de Mallorca
Bartolomé March (1917–1998), Madrid (by descent from the above, his father, by 1970)
Banca López Quesada, Madrid (by 1978)
Sale: Sotheby's, Madrid, 9 February 1984, lot 15
Purchased at the above sale by the present owner

Madrid, Casón del Buen Retiro, I centenario del nacimiento de Sorolla, 1963, no. 11
Madrid, Galería del Cisne, Pintores de fama, 1973. no. 1
Valencia, Banca López Quesada, Pintura española siglo XX. Dos años en Valencia. Exposición conmemorativa de pintores valencianos, 1978, no. 7
New York, IBM Gallery of Science and Art; Saint Louis, Saint Louis Art Museum; San Diego, The San Diego Museum of Art; Valencia, Institut Valenciano de Arte Moderno, The Painter Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida, 1989-90, no. 8

Bernardino de Pantorba, La Vida y La Obra de Joaquín Sorolla. Estudio biográfico y crítico, Madrid, 1970, p. 20, a detail illustrated; p. 177, no. 1280, listed
Blanca Pons-Sorolla, Joaquín Sorolla. Vida y obra, Madrid, 2001, p. 130, fig. 49, discussed and illustrated, p. 729, catalogued
Jose Luis Díez y Javier Barón, Joaquín Sorolla, Madrid, 2009, p. 212, cited

Sorolla’s return to Valencia in 1889 appears to have prompted an ambitious desire to evoke the essence of Valencian life and the artist’s own Mediterranean identity. Escena valenciana (1893) is exemplary of this phase in Sorolla’s career. The work centralises itself on the people and landscape of Valencia: the figures are wearing both traditional clothes and simple work clothes; and the carob tree standing behind them is characteristic of the region’s landscape, and often features in Sorolla’s other such works.  The present work is the largest and arguably most ambitious of the Valencian subjects Sorolla painted at the time. But what is perhaps the greatest feat of this work is its ability to immerse the viewer fully in the scene. We are not mere outsiders; rather, we participate in the warmth, sensuality and laughter and share the sentiments that Sorolla experienced whilst painting it. This impression is rooted in Sorolla’s decision to paint en plein air. The ambience and immediacy are not lost through the process of developing a photograph to be later reimagined in the artist’s studio: they are captured in that very instant. This ability to create a snapshot in time and capture the immediacy of his subjects was to become a trademark of Sorolla’s work.

Though on the surface only one scene is depicted, Sorolla’s grouping of the figures divides the scene in two. This creates the sense that the painting actually provides multiple facets of Valencian life which coexist with one another and heightens the sense that the viewer is a part of the scene. We therefore gather a broader image of Valencian life.



The authenticity of this work has been confirmed by Blanca Pons Sorolla, who will be including it in the forthcoming Sorolla catalogue raisonné (BPS 740).