Ricard Clausells

RICARD CLAUSELLS (Reus, 1864 - Sant Feliu de Llobregat, 1939).
"The dispute of the doctors in the temple", 1907.
Oil on canvas.
Signed and dated in the lower right corner.
The frame is missing.
Measurements: 68 x 118 cm; 96 x 145 cm (frame).

This work is a copy of the painting of the same title by Veronese that is in the Prado Museum in Madrid. It depicts the scene of the last passage of Christ's childhood (Luke 2, 41-50), when at the age of twelve he was taken by his parents to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. Mary and Joseph lost the child, who was later found in the Temple arguing with the doctors. Christ's theological superiority is emphasized by his placement high on the axis of the composition. With his hands he makes a gesture, the so-called digital computation, of enumeration of the arguments put forward before the eyes of the doctors. From the audience stands out a bearded old man who is probably the commissioner, wearing the habit of a knight of the Holy Sepulchre and holding a pilgrim's staff, which suggests that he may have commissioned the painting to commemorate a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.
Ricard Clausells began his training in 1878 studying at the School of Fine Arts in Barcelona and later at the Llotja School. In 1893 he gave painting classes at his home, and in 1897, he edited the second issue of Reus Tranquilo, as he had friends in that city. Between 1900 and 1913 he collaborated in the Semanario Católico de Reus, especially with poems that he sent from Vilafranca, both in Catalan and Spanish. His pictorial work is linked to Vilafranca del Penedès, as he lived there for many years. The City Council commissioned him to create paintings of the illustrious sons of the city, and in 1901 the Gallery of illustrious Vilafranquins was inaugurated. In 1910 he went to live permanently in Sant Feliu with his mother. In this town he painted several religious paintings for churches in Sant Feliu and Vilafranca. From 1915 he decorated the ceiling of the Hall of Sessions of the Town Hall of Vilafranca. When his mother died in 1917, he gave drawing and painting classes at the Asilo Duran, a reform school in Sant Feliu. In 1923 he married Josefina Sanromà from Reus in Barcelona. He did not stop making exhibitions, both in Vilafranca and Sant Feliu and also in Barcelona.