Stunning paintings, and difficult to choose a favourite. One of our friends always asks "Which is your favourite?"
In this case my answer was almost always "The last painting I looked at."
A few days afterwards, the ones which have stayed in my memory are two of his social commentary ones - Otra Margarita! (Another Marguerite) from1892, and Triste Herencia (Sad Inheritance) from 1899. And then there was !Aún dicen que el pescado es caro! (And still they say fish is expensive), and the portrait of the young fisherman , Pescador, Valencia, which is also full of the sea and the light on the water, and children playing.
I loved the family portraits, from the portrait of his wife, Clotilde with a newborn baby, to a couple where the facial expressions beg for captions - Clotilde con traje negro (Clotilde in a black dress)- where she looks as though she's saying, "Let me out of this corset!" and Mis hijos (My children, where the girl on the right is clearly saying "Do I have to sit here much longer, dad?"
And of course the wonderful shining pictures of children at the seaside, glistening with sunlight on wet skin, running along the beach, playing in the sea, and the women in glowing white dresses, and a family sewing a fishing boat sail (Cosiendo la Vela).
A knock-out exhibition.
