- Type of work: Drawing
- Technique: Graphite on paper
- Approximate dimensions: 30 x 21 cm
- Subject: Landscape
- Title: Arboleda, Tenerife
- Author: Diego Crosa y Costa (1869-1942)
- Chronology or Year: 20th Century
- Historical-artistic analysis:
Style: Landscape painting, based on the observation and exaltation of the Canary flora, within the regionalism that dominated the plastic creation in the Canary Islands, during the first half of the 20th century. .
Description: A beautiful specimen of pine with a leafy crown occupies the center of the composition. Standing on a rocky outcrop, surrounded by bushes and shrubs, it dominates the landscape and stands out against a mountainous slope in the background which, together with the sky, occupies the last plane of the composition. With great verism he has transferred to paper a corner of the Canarian landscape, resolved with a precise drawing, very delicate in the stroke, with a great variety of registers in the range of grays, with which he achieves successful effects of lights and shadows.
Date of reception: To be determined through the archival records, probably in the first decades of the 20th century, before the artist’s death in 1942.
Observations: Diego Crosa, known as Crosita was part of the group of island artists who, as members of the Casino, frequently collaborated in the decoration of its halls on the occasion of festive events. Prior to 1907 he had already participated in the decoration of the ceiling in the anteroom of the ballroom and together with Teodomiro Robayna, Felipe Poggi, López Ruiz and Pedro Guezala he was a member of the commission for the ornamentation of the building in 1919. Works of his decorated the Board Room in 1964, according to Valeriano Weyler in his Historia del Casino.
About the author: Born in Santa Cruz de Tenerife (1869 – 1942), Diego Crosa made an important work as a cartoonist and watercolorist, standing out as a caricaturist in the illustration of the magazine New People. With his watercolors he spread the island’s landscape within the exaltation of the Canary Islands, within the regionalism characteristic of the first half of the twentieth century, and under the title of Corners of Tenerife published an album of 27 drawings. However, he is best known for his literary facet; as a poet, he collaborated with the modernist magazine Castalia, leaving among its publications the Canary Islands legend In the mocanera, and a dramatic production of some importance, including the comedy Isla adentro, premiered in 1910 at the Teatro Principal in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Empty cradle or Senderos, as well as the book of coplas (couplets) Folías.
Bibliography:
Archive of the Casino de Tenerife
Ma del Cristo GONZÁLEZ GALVÁN, Ma Rosa ALONSO RODRÍGUEZ: “Crosa y Costa, Diego”, in Gran Enciclopedia Canaria, (Volume V), Ediciones Canarias, 1994, pp1185. Valeriano WEYLER: The small history of a great casino (The one in Santa Cruz de Tenerife). Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1964.
Agustín GUIMERÁ RAVINA, Alberto DARIAS PRÍNCIPE: El Casino de Tenerife 1840 – 1990, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1992.
