Leilão Bidspirit | Circle of Joaquín Sorolla y

Circle of Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida (1863-1923) - Studies for a man (recto); Study for a woman (verso). Studies for a man (recto); black ink in pen on paper. These are three studies for the same male composition. Study for a woman (verso); grease pencil on paper. The physical features of this woman could point to this drawing as a hypothetical sketch for a figure of Emilia Pardo Bazán (1851-1921), who was portrayed by Sorolla. The same male figure studied on two occasions could be related by resemblance in his face to two people: one, the painter Joaquín Vaamonde Cornide (1872-1900), twenty years younger than the writer, hence the difference between the physical features of the woman and the man drawn, if the two studies were strictly contemporary; the other, we should not forget the figure of José Quiroga y Pérez Deza, Pardo Bazán's first husband, who separated in 1883. This drawing deserves to be studied in detail. Provenance: collection of Doña Laura de San Telmo. Laura de san Telmo, whose real name was Laura Navarro Álvarez (Seville 1897, Madrid 1977), was an outstanding flameco dancer and Spanish dancer who, according to one of her most recent biographers (Manuel Ríos Ruiz), ”owes her artistic name to the advice she received from the painter Sorolla”. The good relationship between the Valencian master and the artist is well known, to the extent that she was portrayed by the painter in the canvas entitled Laura de San Temo, dancing (see last picture). This work was sold at Sotheby's, London, in 2003 (19th Century European Paintings, 18-XI-2003, lot 234, p. 57, oil on canvas, 205 x 140 cm, auction price 363,056 €).