JOAQUIN SOROLLA Y BATISDA (1863-1923)
Monte Ulia (243 m -797 ft)
Spain (Basque Country)
The ridge
Mount Ulia (243m - is a minor ridge located east of San Sebastian in the Basque Country, territory of Spain.The ridge stretching out to the east along the coastline sinks in the strait leading to the Bay of Pasaia. The chain overlooks San Sebastian to the west, with the Zurriola beach and the district of Gros lying right under it. This privileged location turned the place into an important leisure and romantic area in the early 20th century, a condition that has remained up to date, despite the pressure of increasing urban development.
Ulia is recorded as Mirall (a Gascon name and term) in 1530 after the whale observation point or rock still to be seen at the top of the ridge, while it was called Uliamendi as it approached the Zurriola inlet. The rock was used to watch out for migratory whales passing off the Basque coast before they became extinct in this area, with the watchers notifying the whalers from Donostia of their presence by means of a bonfire. Later the westernmost tip of the ridge standing out onto the sea, i.e. Monpas, took on a strategic value for a short period after 1898 and became a stronghold with hidden corridors, military facilities and batteries, ready for an attack from the ocean.
The Park of Nurseries of Ulia is at the beginning of the road going to Mount Ulia from Donostia. It is also named Park of Nurseries of Ulia since the nurseries situated inside the park were the provider of plants for the public gardens of Donostia-San Sebastiбn during all the 20th century and until 2008. The park is of great value because it includes two ancient water-tanks, because of its architectonic elements, and because of its flora and fauna.
The painter
Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida was a Spanish painter. Sorolla excelled in the painting of portraits, landscapes, and monumental works of social and historical themes. His most typical works are characterized by a dexterous representation of the people and landscape under the sunlight of his native land. Sorolla's influence on some other Spanish painters, such as Alberto Pla y Rubio and Julio Romero de Torres, was so noted that they are described as "sorollista."
After his death, Sorolla's widow, Clotilde Garcia del Castillo, left many of his paintings to the Spanish public. The paintings eventually formed the collection that is now known as the Museo Sorolla, which was the artist's house in Madrid. The museum opened in 1932.
Sorolla's work is represented in museums throughout Spain, Europe, America, and in many private collections in Europe and America. In 1933, J. Paul Getty purchased ten Impressionist beach scenes made by Sorolla, several of which are now housed in the J. Paul Getty Museum.
In 2007 many of his works were exhibited at the Petit Palais in Paris, alongside those of John Singer Sargent, a contemporary who painted in a similarly impressionist-influenced manner. In 2009, there was a special exhibition of his works at the Prado in Madrid, and in 2010, the exhibition visited the Oscar Niemeyer Museum in Curitiba, Brazil.
From 5 December 2011 to 10 March 2012, several of Sorolla's works were exhibited in Queen Sofia Spanish Institute, in New York. This exhibition included pieces used during Sorolla's eight-year research for The Vision of Spain.
An exhibition titled Sorolla & America explored Sorolla’s unique relationship with the United States in the early twentieth century. The exhibition opened at the Meadows Museum at SMU in Dallas (13 December 2013 - 19 April 2014). From there it traveled to the San Diego Museum of Art (30 May - 26 August 2014) and then to Fundaciun MAPFRE in Madrid (23 September 2014 - 11 January 2015).
The Spanish National Dance Company honored the painter's The Vision of Spain by producing a ballet Sorolla based on the paintings
Early in 1911, Sorolla visited the United States for a second time, and exhibited 152 new paintings at the Saint Louis Art Museum and 161 at the Art Institute of Chicago a few weeks later. Later that year Sorolla met Archie Huntington in Paris and signed a contract to paint a series of oils on life in Spain. These 14 magnificent murals, installed to this day in the Hispanic Society of America building in Manhattan, range from 12 to 14 feet in height, and total 227 feet in length.The major commission of his career, it would dominate the later years of Sorolla's life.
Huntington had envisioned the work depicting a history of Spain, but the painter preferred the less specific 'Vision of Spain', eventually opting for a representation of the regions of the Iberian Peninsula, and calling it The Provinces of Spain. Despite the immensity of the canvases, Sorolla painted all but one en plein air, and travelled to the specific locales to paint them: Navarre, Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia, Elche, Seville, Andalusia, Extremadura, Galicia, Guipuzcoa, Castile, Leon, and Ayamonte, at each site painting models posed in local costume. Each mural celebrated the landscape and culture of its region, panoramas composed of throngs of laborers and locals. By 1917 he was, by his own admission, exhausted. He completed the final panel by July 1919.
Sorolla suffered a stroke in 1920, while painting a portrait in his garden in Madrid. Paralyzed for over three years, he died on 10 August 1923. He is buried in the Cementeri de Valencia, Spain. The Sorolla Room, housing the Provinces of Spain at the Hispanic Society of America, opened to the public in 1926. The room closed for remodeling in 2008, and the murals toured museums in Spain for the first time. The Sorolla Room reopened in 2010, with the murals on permanent display.