Ángel Zárraga (1886-1946)

Ramis Barquet, New York

Mexico City, Museo Rufino Tamayo, Ángel Zárraga, January-February, 1985

Grupo Financiero Bital, Zárraga, Milan, 1997, p. 127, illustrated in color

Although the condition of this work is very good given its scale and the muscular quality of the pigment, the restoration is poor and should be re-examined. The canvas has been lined with wax in an attempt to restrain the cracking in the paint layer. The cracking is still quite visible, particularly through the shirt of the figure. There is also a horizontal break in the canvas running through her hips from the right side to the center that was joined with the lining. There is filling and retouching not only in the shorts and waist but in a few other areas as well. There are other retouches in her chest, slightly left of center, a few spots in the clouds of the sky in the left side, in some small blemishes in the goal post on the right side, and in the soccer ball where a few other small losses have occurred. Her face, arms, hands and legs and feet show no retouches. The painting would respond notably if the lining was re-examined and the restorations removed and replaced. (This condition report has been provided courtesy of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.)
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In her study of sport paintings by Zárraga, Professor Michele Greet comments: "Zárraga’s sportsmen and women were either affiliated with French teams, or idealized archetypes of universal athletes. One of his first images of athletes, Three Soccer Playerspainted in 1922, boldly celebrates female soccer players, highlighting the radically changing terrain of women’s athleticism in the 1920s. The 1924 Olympic planning committee had refused to allow female athletes to participate in the games, provoking athlete and sports advocate Alice Milliat to found the International Women’s Sports Federation in 1921 and to organize the first Women’s World Games (originally called the Women’s Olympic Games) as an alternative to the Olympics in 1922. Zárraga’s first wife, Jeannette Ivanof, played for the French soccer team that won the championship match at the Women’s World Games, inspiring Zárraga to commemorate the victory." (1)

We know of only two single portraits of standing women wearing a soccer club uniform. Both are dated 1926. One is La futbolista morena (Brunette Soccer Player) dressed in red and painted by a hand rail, and La futbolista rubia (Blond Soccer Player) posing by the white goal pole. In the present painting, the model shows a strong constitution but still a quite elegant, classically proportionate feminine body. Her strong legs contrast the graceful, softened features of her face and the melancholic gaze in her eyes. Knowing Zárraga's profound religious feelings (a possible source of inspiration for this particular pose could be a classical Virgin and Child). La Futbolista Rubia is gently holding the ball much in the same way Mary would be holding an infant Jesus. Like the model in La Futbolista Rubia, Mary looks away as a premonition of the suffering awaiting her innocent child. As in classical religious painting, the figure’s face expands chromatically in the background engulfed by clouds that allude to an aura of sainthood.

 

(1)   Michele Greet, "From Cubism to Muralism, Angel Zarraga in Paris," Ángel Zárraga. Retrospectiva, Mexico City: Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes (Apr.-Jul. 2014).