The Countess of Yumuri - Bilbao Fine Arts Museum

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The Countess of Yumuri

Plá, Cecilio

Valencia, 22/11/1860 - Madrid, 03/08/1934

Oil on canvas

150 x 189.5 cm

Cecilio Pla (bottom right hand corner)

1906

First decade of the 20th century

84/63

Acquired in 1984

This work portrays Cecilia de Oliván y Coello of Portugal, countess of Yumuri since 1903. Plá, who made a few high-society portraits, depicts the countess in a personal and natural manner, far from the solemnity and weight of academic portraits. This light and delicate composition is from a period in which the artist was beginning to define his own style after having come into contact with the new artistic trends emerging in Europe. The light focused on the dress emphasises the figure, whose pose and condescending glance at the viewer are in keeping with typical belle époque portraits.

Cecilio Plá's painting, prolific in themes, techniques and styles, was initially characterised by a form of academicism linked to the artistic style prevailing in fin-de-siècle Spain that he had studied in Madrid with Emilio Sala. His numerous travels and sojourns in Europe gave Plá the opportunity of gaining first-hand knowledge of the pictorial trends in vogue at the time. As a result he was able to evolve towards a form of Impressionism charged with the aesthetics of light of the Valencian school, filtered by a naturalistic Art Nouveau and by Realism. Pla's importance and prestige in Spanish painting was a point of reference for the following generation of painters who trained with him, at his workshop and at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid. [Javier Novo González]

Selected bibliography

  • En el umbral de la modernidad : I Centenario del Diario de Burgos : 1891-1991 [Cat. exp.]. Burgos, Diario de Burgos, 1991. p. 86.
  • Requena Vitales, Elena. Cecilio Pla. Valencia, Obra Social y Cultural, 1993. pp. 125-193, n° cat. 14.
  • Cecilio Pla. Valencia, Bancaja, 1994. pp. 125-193, n° cat. 14.
  • De Fortuny à Picasso : trente ans de peinture espagnole 1874-1906 [Cat. exp.]. París, Réunion de Musées Nationaux, 1994. p. 102, n° cat. 50.
  • Cecilio Pla [Cat. exp.]. Madrid, Fundación Mapfre, 1998.
  • Cecilio Pla [Cat. exp.]. Segovia, Obra Social y Cultural, 2000. pp. 34-35.
  • Cat. Cecilio Pla. Iruña-Pamplona, Caja de Ahorros de Navarra, 2000. pp. 11, 18, 30-31.
  • El retrato elegante [Cat. exp.]. Madrid, Museo Municipal, 2000. pp. 93-94, n° cat. 43.
  • Musée des Beaux Arts de Bilbao : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2006. p. 136.
  • Bilbao Fine Arts Museum : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2006. p. 136.
  • Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao : guía. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2006. p. 136.
  • Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao : guía. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2011. p. 136, n° cat. 93.
  • Bustreo, Federica. Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bilbao : maîtres anciens et première moitié du XX siècle. Florencia, Scala Group, 2011. pp. 91-93.
  • Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa : gida. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2012. p. 136, n° cat. 93.
  • Bilbao Fine Arts Museum : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2014. p. 136.
  • Musée des Beaux Arts de Bilbao : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2014. p. 136.