Ricardo Balaca and Orejas-Canseco

RICARDO BALACA Y OREJAS-CANSECO (Lisbon, 1844- Aravaca, Madrid 1880).
"Pair of portraits", c. 1859.
Oil on canvas.
Preserved period frames with faults.
Signed and dated.
Measurements. 110 x 86 cm; 132 x 105 cm (frame).
Pair of portraits painted in oil. Both the format, the composition and the genre of each of the protagonists, indicate that these works were conceived from the origin as an indivisible couple. In both cases the oval format envelops a figure in the foreground who is shown to the viewer with a long bust, slightly turned in three quarters, as was customary in portraits of the period. In one of the cases we see a woman, dressed in black, so it may be a widow. The man is in military uniform.
Son of the painter José Balaca, exiled in Portugal, Ricardo was trained in Madrid, where he studied with Federico de Madrazo at the Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando. He cultivated pictorial genres related to romanticism, such as the themes of customs, landscape and portraiture, highlighting in this last section the "Portrait of Luis González Martínez" and the "Self-portrait" painted around 1863, both preserved in the Prado Museum. Balaca was especially famous for his mastery of war themes, such as "Episode of the Battle of Bailén" or "The Battle of Almansa" (Prado), painted by Balaca when he was only seventeen years old and awarded a mention at the National Exhibition of Fine Arts in 1862. His skill earned him, in fact, the commission to accompany King Alfonso XII in 1876 to the northern front. His figure is situated between the fully romantic generation and the one identified with the eclecticism of the second half of the century. He also made some illustration works, among which the edition of "Don Quixote" of 1879 stands out. His most famous works were also published in artistic magazines of the time, such as "La Ilustración Española y Americana". Ricardo Balaca is represented in the Prado Museum, the San Telmo Museum in San Sebastián, the Fine Arts Museums of Havana, Bilbao and Jaén, the Cerralbo and Lázaro Galdiano Museums in Madrid and the Congress of Deputies.