Carme Cortés

CARME CORTÈS LLADÓ (Santa Coloma de Gramanet, 1892 - Mexico City, 1979).
"Female portrait", ca.1954.
Oil on canvas.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Measurements: 46.5 x 37.7 cm; 59.5 x 51.5 cm (frame).

Female portrait of intimate and delicate character. The composition is centered in the serene expression of the model, highlighted by means of a loose and nuanced brushstroke that softly models the features and the flesh. The warm tones of the background and clothing contrast with the luminosity of the face and neck, creating an enveloping and refined atmosphere.

The work shows a painting of clear figurative sensibility, in which the treatment of color and pictorial matter refers to the portrait tradition of the mid-twentieth century. The free brushstroke and the use of chromatic nuances bring freshness and naturalness to the scene, especially emphasizing the attention to the gesture and the gaze of the model.

Carme Cortès i Lladó was a Spanish impressionist painter. At the end of the civil war she went into exile in France and in 1941 she arrived in Mexico, where she created the School of Plastic Arts at the Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León. She was married to the republican politician Jaume Aiguadé Miró, deputy of the Cortes of the Republic and mayor of Barcelona, and was the mother of the painter Carme Aguadé i Cortés. Back in Barcelona, she studied at the Escuela Superior de Bellas Artes directed by the painter Francesc d'Assís Galí and devoted herself fully to painting.