Ramon Casas

RAMÓN CASAS CARBÓ (Barcelona, 1866 - 1932).
"Júlia Peraire, Original project for a poster "La Prensa de Chile", 1907.
Mixed media on paper.
Includes certificate of authenticity issued by Adrià Codina, descendant of the heirs of Ramon Casas Carbó.
Measurements: 86 x 58 cm; 121,5 x 93 cm (frame).

One of the disciplines in which Ramon Casas achieved special renown was poster design, a field in which this work occupies a prominent place in his production. It is the original project for a poster for La Prensa de Chile, in which Júlia Peraire is conceived as an allegorical figure of monumental character, without renouncing the modernist and symbolist aesthetics that defined the artist's career and brought him wide recognition.

The composition presents his great muse seated, holding an imposing red flag that invades much of the background and gives the scene an intense visual force and a marked patriotic sense. Júlia wears a classically inspired tunic, with sober and fluid lines, evoking the feminine representations of freedom or the republic so frequent in the allegorical language of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The modeling of the face stands out especially, defined by firm and expressive features that accentuate Júlia's strong personality and make her a fully recognizable image.

It is especially significant that the work was executed in 1907, the same year in which Casas painted his famous La Sargantain. As in the canvas kept at the Círculo del Liceo, Júlia Peraire reaffirms here her central role within the painter's creative universe, becoming the iconographic axis of one of Ramón Casas's most technically and expressive mature periods. Far from the commissioned portrait and the mere social representation, the artist places Júlia as the absolute protagonist of the composition, building an image of silent authority and powerful stage presence.

A leading figure of modernism and one of the most internationally renowned Spanish artists of his time, Ramón Casas developed a decisive career between Barcelona and Paris, with an early presence at the Salon des Champs Elysées. His work is now part of the main public collections -Museo del Prado, MNAC, Museo Reina Sofía, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, among others-, confirming his position as an essential reference of modern portraiture and Spanish art collecting between the centuries.