Vicente López y Portaña

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Vicente López y Portaña (b. September 19, 1772, Valencia, Spain, d. August 22, 1850, Madrid, Spain) was a Spanish painter, considered the best portrait painter of his time.

Selfportrait

[edit] Life

Vicente López y Portaña was born in Valencia on September 19, 1772. His parents were Cristóbal López Sanchordi and Manuela Portaña Miró. Vicente López began formally studying painting in Valencia at the age of thirteen, he was a disciple of father Villanueva, a Franciscan monk, and he studied at the Academy of San Carlos in his native city. He was seventeen when he won first price in drawing and coloring receiving a scholarship to study in the Academy of San Fernando in Madrid. For three years he lived in Madrid where he was a disciple of Mariano Salvador Maella, a painter from Valencia. Vicente López returned to Valencia in 1794 and subsequently became vice-director of painting at the Academy where he had studied as a boy. In 1795 he married Maria Piquer, they have two sons: Bernardo and Luis, who were also painters, following their father’s style but with little accomplishments. In 1801 López was named President of the Academy of San Carlos.

When king Charles IV visited the city of Turia in 1802, the king appointed him an honorary court painter at the same time he gave him some comitions that he executed successfully. He was already well known and regarded when in 1814 López was called to the court of Ferdinand VII, the Spanish king, who appointed him official court painter and received a royal appointment. Shortly thereafter he succeeded Goya as Royal Court Painter during the reign of Ferdinand VII who also appointed him as drawing teacher of Queen Isabella of Braganza and later of Queen Maria Amalia of Saxony. In 1817 he was named President of the Academy of San Fernando.

Vicente López was a prolific painter executing many religious, allegorical, historic and mythological scenes, but he specialized in portraits. During his long career he painted nearly every notable person in Spain during the first half of the 1800s.

Vicente López painted in 1826 a portrait of Francisco Goya when the famous master visited the court from Bordeaux, where the Aragonese painter was then living. Goya was then 80 and would die two years later. It was said that Goya got bored posing for his colleague who was very meticulous and a stickler for detail, and that for this reason the portrait is inferior to others by López. However, for this precise reason, and because of the strong personality of the model this is one of López's most lively and best known works.

Vicente López spent the remainder of his life in Madrid painting portraits of statesmen, academics, and other important figures, as well as dramatic and emotional religious subjects. When he died he was court painter of Quenn Isabella II. He died in Madrid on April 16, 1828. He was seventy eight years old.

[edit] Style

Portrait of Francisco Goya, 1826

Vicente López was a Neo-classicist painter but he retained certain traces of the Rococo style. He had the Neo-classical emphasis on masterly drawing, though with less rigidity. López is considered the best Spanish painter of his time, second only to Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes.

Lopez’s style is dominated by the influenced of Mengs and the Academicism and he was unaffected by the romanticism popular at the end of his career. López had great skills at drawing and with the use of the brush, but he did not achieve the level of genius as Goya did. His best works are probably his drawing and small scale painting.