In June, for the third time for this project, I crossed Spain and found myself once again in Valencia. This time it was to see the famed Corpus Christi celebrations there on the 19th. The goal was to find some of the characters that populate Sorolla's canvas from that region. I wasn't disappointed...
Couples on Horseback, Joaquin Sorolla, 1916
The heat had taken me by surprise. I was wrapped up in at least two too many layers and sweat was now creating its own river system inside my clothes. I'd known it was going to be warmer, of course, but I hadn't been expecting this.
I'd flown in from Cantabria on a morning flight and the temperature was climbing steadily touching 30c by the time I was wandering over the town in search of my hostel. Seville is like an ambush on the senses; heat aside, the city creeps up and snatches you away from your perceived normality. All five senses are needed in equal measure to truly appreciate it and it is impossible to wriggle free from its grasp. Sorolla loved Seville and felt this allure keenly. He painted no fewer than four of the fourteen paintings in the Vision of Spain series in or around the city. Within an hour of landing I too shared his enthusiasm for the place; it was impossible not to.
La Giralda
I skirted around the Giralda, Seville's exotic minaret built by the Moors in the 12th century and subsequently re-appropriated by the Spanish Christians into a unique bell-tower for the second largest cathedral in all Christendom, and took a narrow side street up and around to my digs, a modest backpackers' hostel set in a wonderful 500 year old Jewish house which formed part of the 'Barrio Santa Cruz'. Balconies on three levels rose above a typical Andaluz interior patio and up top there was a two-tier roof terrace giving a sea-of-terracotta-tile view in all directions punctuated by the Giralda and other, lesser, church spires. It wasn't quite the 5-star Grand Hotel de Paris in which Sorolla had installed himself on his visits here but my top bunk in an 8-bed mixed dorm would do just fine. I freshened up, namely peeled off a few layers, and headed into the maze of cobbled streets that surrounded the hostel. I had things to do, places to find and some detective work to do. There wasn't a minute to lose...
Hot: just a typical April day in the Andalusian capital
In the spring of 1915, Sorolla was already on his third, and final, trip to the Andalusian capital as part of the Vision of Spain series. Having already painted the Easter processions in the 'Holy Week Penitents' as well as a more rural scene of horseman driving fighting bulls in the surrounding countryside in 'The Round-up', both in 1914, the artist was back in Seville to paint another two canvases, this time to depict a more cultural side to Spain in the form of Flamenco and Bullfighting. 100 years later and now here I was immersing myself in these two titans of Spanish identity. Was it all just a gimmicky, soulless and plastic facade designed to perpetuate the stereotypes and myths of a Spain viewed from the outside (and to generate more than a few tourist euros) or was there something more real, more tangible, to be grasped onto here? I needed to find out more and headed straight to Sevilla's bullring, 'La Maestranza'.
La Maestranza is widely considered to be the most important bullring in the world and certainly its oldest. The bullfighting season traditionally begins here on Easter day and the daily fights over the next week would form the first major event in the tauromachia calendar. I had a ticket for the following day's event but I wanted to get a feel for the place; I circled the building and then installed myself at the back entrance, otherwise known as 'puerta 16'. Barriers had been placed either side of it and I squeezed my way to the front. The Policía local were there to act as bodyguards and every now and then the thick red wooden gates opened and an important looking person would be allowed to enter. Stood as I was right next to these gates I was given a tantalizing glimpse into the backstage world of bullfighting.
'Puerta 16'
This was real. Standing there for the best part of an hour as the crowd grew it struck me just how similar this was to being backstage at a rock concert, waiting for your favourite band or musician to waltz past and perhaps get their autograph or a photo with them. When the Matadors and their entourage finally arrived there was a definite aura of the rich and famous about them. Phones snapped away, immortalizing the moment, women shouted 'hola guapo!' and suited men with slicked-back oiled hair looked on in a haze of pride whilst the bullfighters purposely and self-confidently strode past and out of sight through the heavy wooden doors and into the bowels of Seville's great bullring. I would be back tomorrow and, with the rest of the local crowd, wandered off in the general direction of the Fería, the epicentre of the celebrations.
