Museo Carmen Thyssen

Joaquín Sorolla (1863−1923) discovered Jávea in the autumn of 1896. The scenery of the place proved to be quite a revelation for the painter, then thirty-three. Sorolla was familiar with the landscapes of the beaches of his native Valencia, where he had spent hours on end making sketches and painting genre scenes of fishermen in their boats, fisherwomen on the beach engaged in various tasks, children playing on the shore and oxen hauling in boats, among others.  

In Jávea, however, Sorolla came across a natural landscape completely different from the vast, flat and sandy coastline of the gulf of Valencia. There he discovered the mountainous terrain of the imposing Montgó massif stretching down to the sea at the cape of San Antonio, and the majestic cliffs around the cape of the Nao. The hilly relief created a rugged coastline with an intricate pattern of headlands, cliffs, gullies, islets and coves, all set against the backdrop of the immense, crystal-clear waters of the Mediterranean Sea, enhanced by the myriad greens of the vegetation of Jávea’s nature surroundings.

In short, there Sorolla found views of the sea and land that he painted passionately during his four stays there in 1896, 1898, 1900 and 1905. This scenery prompted him to explore his own painting in greater depth, leading to a progression in his art. In Jávea he discovered the effects of light falling on the landscape, sea and rocks with a vibrancy, intensity and variety of hues he had never previously experienced, which prompted him to advance towards new approaches to painting.

To illustrate this Sorolla at his peak, whose art underwent a transformation when he came into contact with the beauty of Jávea, this exhibition brings together twenty or so works from the Museo Sorolla executed during several of his painting campaigns, especially that of 1905, at the height of his creative maturity. Rocks at Jávea and the White Boat, from the Carmen Thyssen Collection, also belongs to this period. Deeply attracted and excited by everything around him, Sorolla experimented and evolved towards new artistic ideas, spurred by the sight of the coasts of this ‘sublime, immense [Jávea], the best thing I know of to paint’.