Joaquin Sorolla: The Complete Story
Joaquin Sorolla was the Spanish painter of sunlight. His beach scenes blaze with Mediterranean glare: children running in the surf, white sails, wet skin and rippling water, all caught in quick, confident strokes. Wildly popular in his lifetime, he was hailed as the master of light, and his late years were crowned by one vast, ambitious project for America.
He gave eight years to a single commission, a painted journey across all of Spain.
Born: Valencia, Spain, 1863
Known for: sun drenched beach scenes, Spanish light, the Hispanic Society murals
Died: Cercedilla, Spain, 1923
The master of light
Sorolla painted sunshine better than almost anyone. He worked outdoors on the beaches of Valencia, racing to catch the exact dazzle of light on water and the shadows cast by running children. See what is en plein air.
His brush is fast and loose, close to Impressionism but warmer and stronger and warmer, with strokes that look careless and land perfectly. The result feels like a held breath of summer. See what is impressionism.
More than the sunshine
There is a serious side too. His early Sad Inheritance shows disabled children bathing in the sea under a priest's care, a tender and unsettling picture that won him a grand prize and international fame.
He was also a fine portraitist, painting Spanish society and his own family with the same fluent, sunlit touch. See what is portrait painting.
The vision of Spain
In 1911 the Hispanic Society of America in New York commissioned Sorolla to paint the regions of Spain. He spent eight years travelling and painting fourteen enormous panels of festivals, costumes and landscapes, around two hundred feet of canvas in all.
The effort drained him, and he never fully saw the murals installed. They remain a dazzling, exhausting love letter to his country.
Joaquin Sorolla, your questions answered
What is Joaquin Sorolla famous for?
Sun filled beach scenes and his mastery of light, plus the huge Vision of Spain murals.
What style did he paint in?
A fast, light filled style close to Impressionism, often called luminism.
What are the Hispanic Society murals?
Fourteen vast panels of the regions of Spain, painted over eight years for New York.
When did he die?
In 1923, in Spain, after a stroke had ended his painting three years earlier.
Why the light still warms
Sorolla was once dismissed as merely crowd pleasing, too sunny to be serious. Taste has turned. His beaches now travel the world in blockbuster shows, and his home in Madrid is a museum where the Spanish light he chased still pours through the windows.
One last detail. A stroke in 1920, while he was painting a portrait in his garden, ended his career in an instant and left him unable to work for his final three years. The painter of endless summer was stopped mid brushstroke.