Our old friend and former Group Leader Peter Atkinson flies in especially from Canada to present

Sorolla, Benlliure and Blasco: Valencia’s Greatest Painter, Sculptor and Writer

The presentation will explore the work and lives of these three men. Each was a brilliant
and prolific artist in his field and, remarkably, they were all born in the city during a five-year
period in the 1860s: painter, Joaquín Sorolla y Bastide (1863-1923); sculptor, Mariano
Benlliure y Gil (1862-1947); and writer, Vicente Blasco Ibáñez (1867-1928). They knew each
other and, without being particularly close, they were friends.

Almost all of Joaquín’s work is oil on canvas and was mostly done outdoors under the Mediterranean sun; he is known as a “painter of light”.  He painted people at work and play, did a lot of landscapes and garden scenes, and accepted many commissions for portraits.  His family (wife and three children) were often his subjects.

Mariano had intended to be a painter but, on a visit to Rome, the work of Michelangelo inspired him to become a sculptor.  While most of his work is bronze, he was also a gifted chiseller of marble.  He produced many busts and close to one hundred monumental works, often large and complex and mostly in Spain (Valencia and Madrid in particular).

Vicente had the most varied life of the three.  With 50 titles, he was principally a novelist, the early ones being set around the Albufera lake to the south of Valencia.  He also wrote 15 non-fiction books and was a journalist; he founded a newspaper for which he wrote almost a thousand articles.  And he was a left-wing, republican politician: anti-monarchy, anti-Church, and anti-landowner.  He spent a decade in the Cortes, the national parliament, and had three stints in jail.