Eugenio Lucas Villaamil

EUGENIO LUCAS VILLAAMIL (Madrid, 1858 - 1918).
"Landscape with ruins".
Oil on panel. Cradled.
Signed in the lower left corner.
Measurements: 50 x 35 cm; 70 x 55 cm (frame).

In this panel Eugenio Lucas Villaamil is introduced in the genre of the Caprichos, which enjoyed great success from the nineteenth century, especially as a result of Romanticism. The taste for the artistic remains of the past, the generalization of the travels of writers and artists in search of monuments and works of art that served as a source of inspiration, and the discovery of important ancient remains such as those of the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum undoubtedly contributed to the success of the genre. It is a pictorial genre, moreover, that has its roots in the seventeenth century, in the veduta, not always topographical, but sometimes extremely imaginative, of artists such as Canaletto and others.

Son of the painter Eugenio Lucas Velázquez, also a follower of Francisco de Goya, he inherited from his father the speed and ease in the use of the brush. His brushstroke, short and thick, denounces his deep admiration for the great Spanish masters, such as Velázquez, Carreño, Murillo and, above all, Goya. His painting moves away from academicism and is loose and undone, impastoed and of great chromatic richness, while his subjects speak of the people and their customs. He studied at the Special School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving in Madrid, where he stood out for his mastery as a draftsman. He completed his training by assiduously visiting the Prado Museum, where he copied several works by Goya. He also frequented the intellectual circles of Madrid at the end of the 19th century, until he was discovered by the patron José Lázaro Galdiano, who appointed him as his chamber painter and commissioned him to decorate his palace in Parque Florido. Among the distinctions he received during his lifetime was that of Knight of the Order of Carlos III. Lucas Villamil's work is preserved in the National Gallery in Washington D. C., the Lázaro Galdiano and Mapfre Foundations in Madrid, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Havana, Badajoz and Alava, the J. Paul Getty Museum in California, the San Telmo Museum in San Sebastián, the Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection and the Camón Aznar Museum.