Anselmo Guinea

ANSELMO GUINEA Y UGALDE (Abando, Bilbao, 1854 - 1906).
"Odalisque", Rome, 1882.
Watercolour on paper.
Signed, located and dated in the upper left corner.
Work exhibited in the retrospective of the artist held at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum in 2012.
Work catalogued in "Anselmo Guinea (1855-1906). The origins of modernity in Basque painting", p. 100.
Measurements: 66 x 100 cm; 95 x 130 cm (frame).
Anselmo Guinea painted "Odalisque" during his stay in Rome, where he perfected and studied ancient techniques after having trained in the studio-workshop of Federico de Madrazo. With its almost calligraphic outline and diaphanous, transparent colours, it is one of the few works with an Orientalist theme that he produced. Almost as if playing with the viewer, the young woman appears barefoot, covered with rich fabrics from her ankles to her head, while insinuating just enough not to escape her and her rapturous sensuality. She lies on a harem bed, warming herself with the smoking bronze brazier in front of her, in an ostentatious interior with vases and other decorative arts depicted in detail. She assumes a fully dynamic pose in which one of her arms is raised to her head. Formally, the scene is filtered by a chromaticism based on subtle transparencies and delicate contrasts, carefully nuanced and worked in detail to enhance the volumetric expressiveness of the woman's body.
Anselmo Guinea trained at the Special School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving in Madrid and in the studio-workshop of Federico de Madrazo. On returning to the Basque Country in 1876, he was given the chair of drawing at the School of Arts and Crafts, a post he held until his death. Later, in 1881, he travelled to Rome to perfect his skills and study ancient techniques. In 1890 he travelled to Paris in the company of Manuel Losada, where he attended classes at the Gerveix academy, thus coming into contact with the Impressionist trends that were then gaining ground in the French capital. He became acquainted at first hand with Impressionism, but also with Pointillism and Art Nouveau, and from then on his painting took a turn, becoming more luminous and fluid. Guinea held exhibitions of his work in that city (1882, 1894) and in Madrid. He also took part in the International Exhibition in Barcelona in 1890 and in the one organised by the Municipal Museum of the same city in 1898, being awarded the second medal in the latter. He took part in the National Exhibitions of Fine Arts, winning third medals in the 1884 and 1899 editions. He was also awarded a gold medal at the Provincial Exhibition of Vizcaya held in Bilbao in 1882. He worked in watercolour, easel and mural painting, and in the latter discipline he decorated several public buildings, such as the Vizcaya Provincial Council, and private residences such as the one in Sota (Ibaigane). A pioneer in Spain of the new pictorial styles that were being developed abroad, Guinea is one of the most outstanding patriarchs of modern Basque painting. He was a magnificent draughtsman, and also mastered foreshortening, diaphanous and transparent colours and the serene, almost melancholic expressions of the Biscayan people he portrayed. His contribution to the renewal of Basque genre painting and landscape painting was decisive; despite the fact that industrialisation was beginning to alter the landscape, Guinea remained attached to a ruralist vision, for which he found types and motifs in the idyllic valley of Arratia. At the turn of the century, his friendship with various local collectors, and above all with the shipowner Ramón de la Sota, enabled him to broaden his thematic range with marine scenes and also to explore the artistic possibilities of stained glass in a modernist vein. In 2012, the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum dedicated the first monographic exhibition of his work to him. He is currently mainly represented in that museum, as well as in the Fine Arts Museum of Álava, the Casa de Juntas in Gernika, the Palacio Foral de Bilbao and other public and private collections.