Joaquín Sunyer Sitges 1874-1956

Estate of the artist; thence by descent

The warm colouring, interior setting and rhythmic, languid pose of the nude in the present work reflect Sunyer's debt as much to French painting of the period as to Spanish. A student at the School of Fine Arts in Barcelona together with Nonell, Mir, Canals and Torres García, Sunyer travelled to Paris in 1896. There he found work as an illustrator and befriended Picasso and other young avant-garde artists of the day. Leading artists who informed his style at the time included Toulouse-Lautrec, Daumier, Cézanne and Gauguin. Sunyer was especially influenced at this time by Degas and Bonnard, the latter's nudes having a particularly strong association with the present, albeit later, work.    

By 1910 Sunyer's work had evolved into a lyrical Mediterranean classicism. Redolent of the work of Aristide Maillol with whom he had remained friends since his early days in Paris, this new departure identified Sunyer as the most recognisable painter of Noucentism, the style that dominated Catalan art of this period. In 1912 Sunyer went to Céret in Provence to join Picasso, Braque, Gris, Max Jacob and Maillol. The fusion of new ideas stimulated by Cubism brought about stylistic changes in Sunyer's work, and from his colourful street and country scenes his compositions became more structural and monumental in style. During a trip to Italy in 1913, Sunyer was struck by the frescoes of Luca Signorelli in the Cathedral at Orvieto. These were to influence the artist's work by adding pure and volumetric forms in his paintings of landscapes as well as nudes, while the hot colours and supine position of the present model suggests Sunyer's awareness of Matisse.