Studio: international art (58.1913)

Studio- Talk

with warmth in a simple scheme of colour. I
would particularly mention that of the artist's
daughter and an earlier portrait of a young lady in
white against a background of dark green foliage.
A series of landscape studies dating from the
seventies and eighties of the last century, and the
original illustrations to Pushkin's " Song of Oleg "
published some years ago, completed the exhibi-
tion of Victor Vasnetzoff's works at the Historical
Museum. P. E.

CHICAGO.—When on the occasion of
Joaquin Sorolla's initial visit to America
it was decided that the itinerary pre-
scribed would not include Chicago, the
disappointment to the Middle West was heartfelt.
The works of Sorolla having been disposed of so
entirely in the East, the notion was that some time
must necessarily elapse before any very adequate
exhibition from his brush could again be placed
before the public. However, like a veritable
Aladdin, this extraordinary man set to work and
in the space of a couple of years accomplished a

prodigious amount of labour, represented by over
a hundred canvases, which he imported direct
from his Spanish studio to the Art Institute of
Chicago, where the collection remained for a month,
after which it was shipped to St. Louis.

The exhibited works included a number of
interesting portraits. One of Queen Victoria of
Spain, a companion to the portrait of King Alfonso,
previously produced, was, like that, executed by
royal command as a gift to the Hispanic Society
of America. A greater work, technically speaking,
was that of Don Jose Echegaray, the great Spanish
writer, who here formed the subject of a brilliant,
if perhaps painful, characterisation ; for the blue
veins throbbing in the temples indicated that the
supreme battle between an undying mentality and
a shattered bodily abode was not far distant.
Exquisite qualities were noted in the three por-
traits of the artist's wife. In one the figure was
posed at the nearer end of a yellow sofa with the
hands lying relaxed in the lap, the gown being of
delicate pink, veiled in white. In. another, Sefiora

' THE ARTIST'S WIFE AND DAUGHTERS " BY JOAQUIN SOROLLA Y BASTIDA

(By courtesy of the Hispanic Society of America)

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