01 Marine Painting, With Footnotes, #272

Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida, Spanish, 1863 - 1923

Puerto de Guetaria, País Vasco/ The Basque Port of Guetaria, c. 1910

Oil on canvas

69 by 80cm., 27 by 31½in.

Private property

Getaria is a coastal town located in the province of Gipuzkoa, in the autonomous community of Basque Country, in the North of Spain. This coastal village is located on the Urola Coast, with Zarautz to the east and Zumaia to the west.

Getaria is known for being Juan Sebastián Elcano’s hometown, a seaman well-known for being the first man to circumnavigate the earth. He was captain of the Nao Victoria, the one ship in Magellan's ill-fated fleet which completed the voyage.

Today, Getaria is also famous for its restaurants serving grilled fish and a white wine with a protected designation of origin which is cultivated in the surroundings of this coastal town and takes the name of Getariako Txakolina. Moreover, the Cristobal Balenciaga Museum is also located in this village. More on Getaria

Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida (27 February 1863 – 10 August 1923) was born in Valencia. He and his younger sister were orphaned 2 years later when both their parents died from a cholera outbreak.

From an early age it was clear that Sorolla had a passion for art. Instead of academic study, the young Sorolla would spend his school days making drawings in his copybooks and by the age of 15 he was winning major prizes for his paintings at the Academy of Valencia.

By his mid 20s Sorolla had firmly established himself on the national stage and by 30 he had displayed paintings in salons and international exhibitions in Madrid, Paris, Venice, Munich, Berlin, and Chicago. By the turn of the century Sorolla was recognised as one of the western world’s greatest living artists, receiving gold medals in several major international exhibitions.

Over the first decade of the 20th century Sorolla’s output was incredible, both in quality and quantity. As well as painting many striking portraits, his new found wealth enabled him to devote himself more fully to painting where and what he wanted. Throughout this decade Sorolla was completing hundreds of paintings each year, often canvases of 2 metres or more painted direct on the beach.

In 1909, the Hispanic Society of America hosted an exhibition of Sorolla’s works in New York City. Of the 356 paintings on show a total of 195 were sold.

In 1911 Sorolla started work on a major commission to produce a series of vast panels celebrating the life and customs of the different regions of Spain for the Hispanic Society’s new headquarters in New York. This enormous and exhausting endeavour was to dominate the next 8 years of Sorolla's life, although he still managed to find time to paint some of his most stunning beach scenes.

Sorolla suffered a paralyzing stroke in 1920 and died three years later. More on Joaquín Sorolla 

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