Fernando de Amárica

FERNANDO DE AMÁRICA (Vitoria, 1866 - 1956).
"Banks of a forest in the Zadorra near Criptana", 1926.
Oil on panel.
Signed in the lower corner, dated and dedicated on the back.
Measurements: 35 x 23,5 cm; 46 x 36,5 cm (frame).

Fernando de Amárica immortalizes here a wooded and fluvial corner near the town of Criptana. A Basque painter, Fernando de Amárica began his training in his adolescence, in the drawing classes of the School of Arts and Crafts of Vitoria, although it was not until he finished his Law studies, which he attended in Valladolid, that he decided to devote himself fully to painting, at the age of twenty-two. Some years later, in 1895, he made a trip to Rome, where he went to draw at the Círculo de Bellas Artes. On his return he settled in Madrid (1898), where he furthered his artistic training in the workshop of Joaquín Sorolla, and shortly after began his professional artistic career, participating in 1899 in the National Exhibition of Fine Arts, presenting the paintings "La Vega de Güell en Abril" and "Tarde de septiembre a orillas del Zadorra (traspuntes)" (September afternoon on the banks of the Zadorra (sketches). Amárica specialized in landscapes and gardens from 1900, following a trip to Paris, where he met Sisley and Monet and participated in the Salon of 1903 and 1905. Somewhat later, in 1908, he participated again in an official Parisian exhibition, in this case at the Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts. Already fully established, in the following decades he held important exhibitions of his work in Madrid and Barcelona, participated in group exhibitions abroad and made new trips to Paris. Likewise, Fernando de Amárica was the teacher of other Basque painters such as Ricardo Sacristán Arrieta. He is currently represented in the Prado Museum, the Fine Arts Museums of Bilbao, San Sebastian and Alava and the Foundation that bears his name in Vitoria, as well as in other public and private collections.