Lot 203: FERNANDO ALVAREZ DE SOTOMAYOR

FERNANDO ALVAREZ DE SOTOMAYOR SPANISH 1875 - 1960 SALIDA DE MISA EN JORNES (LEAVING MASS, JORNES) signed Sotomayor lower right oil on board 67 by 100cm., 26¼ by 39¼in.

Paris, Galerie Charpentier, Exposition Sotomayor, 1932, no. 3
Buenos Aires, Galería Witcomb, Exposición Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor, 1932, no. 8

Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón, Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor, Santiago de Compostela, 1952, no. 6
José Carlos Valle Pérez & Fundación Pedro Barrié de la Maza, Fernando A. de Sotomayor, Santiago de Compostela, 2004, p. 416, no. 631, catalogued & illustrated

With his reputation as an artist on the rise, on a visit to his native Galicia in 1905 Sotomayor's interest in the region was re-awakened. Thereafter his work centred on the essential truths to be found in the local communities, the moral strength of the people with whom he came into contact and the beauty of the local landscape.

A pupil of the history painter and portraitist, Manuel Domínguez y Sánchez, Sotomayor studied in Madrid at the San Fernando Academy. At the age of twenty-four he travelled to Rome, France and Holland. In 1907 he travelled to Chile where he became director of the Escuela de Bellas Artes in Santiago, a post that he retained until 1911. In 1929 he was appointed Director of the Prado, and thereafter Director of the Real Academia de San Fernando, Madrid.

The young girl in the present work (also known as 'Sunday Morning') appears in another painting of the period, Joven Gallega (fig. 1).


FIG. 1, Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor, Joven Gallega, circa 1929, oil on canvas, The Hispanic Society of America, New York
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