Real Casino de Tenerife https://rctfe.com/en/ El Real Casino de Tenerife, fundado en 1840, es la Sociedad cultural más antigua de Canarias. Fri, 15 Sep 2023 10:25:59 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5 https://rctfe.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/cropped-Logo-Casino-Icono-32x32.png Real Casino de Tenerife https://rctfe.com/en/ 32 32 Allegory of the Earth – Néstor Martín Fernández de la Torre https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-earth-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/ https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-earth-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 11:00:25 +0000 https://rctfe.com/allegory-of-the-earth-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/


  1. Type of work: Mural painting
  2. Technique: Oil on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: The central panel: 400 x 1000 cm. The sides: 400 x 330 cm
  4. Theme: Allegorical
  5. Title: Allegory of the Earth
  6. Author: Néstor Martín Fernández de la Torre (1887-1938)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1935
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Exaltation of the world of the Canary Islands following symbolist and aesthetic guidelines typical of modernism.

Description: The set formed by two great themes, El Mar en el testero sur and La Tierra en el testero norte, is all of it a song of exaltation in which the Canarian is glorified through the work of the island men and women. Both are conceived as triptychs distributed in three scenes that develop in compositional and thematic continuity, where with the elements of nature, previously studied in detail, as in the case of flora, he recreates a mythical and allegorical world of muscular men and women, of portentous anatomy. With a compositional complexity full of foreshortenings and a certain baroque style in the perspectives and in the dynamic tension achieved with a perfect mastery of drawing, mainly supported by the strength of the curved line, the sobriety and restraint of the color stands out. In both panels, distributed respectively in three scenes, the most festive content of the theme occupies the central part, presenting on the sides the images more related to work. In the painting dedicated to the sea, the central scene is a sailor’s parade of muscular men, like demigods, carrying a large boat, the central axis that drives the composition, accompanied by those who carry the buoys and fisherwomen with baskets and trays with the fruits of the catch. On both sides are represented the works related to water, the salting of fish on the left and watering on the right that together with the row of earthenware jars located between white walls and lush philodendrons form a set of great plastic effect, which contrasts with the flora of cacti and cactus on the left side. In the panel La Tierra, again a pilgrimage scene occupies the central part, with peasant women riding camels led by peasants who cover their backs with the typical Esperanza blanket. The representation of bananas and men carrying baskets with tomatoes in the side scenes has been interpreted as a tribute to the new products that sustain the island’s agricultural economy, as opposed to the cycle of cochineal that has already been overcome, to which the tuneras allude. The contrast between leisure and work is accompanied here by a greater attention given to the flora of cardons and piteras or to the magnificent specimen of the dragon tree, symbol of the region, but also of fertility and long life. In this sense, the symbolic content of what is represented is very rich and varied; it has been identified as the contrast between north and south, or between the new and the old, also hiding a rich content of meanings in the symbolic language that each plant could contain. As for the treatment of the human being, he stands out for his beauty and ambiguity, with miguelanguelescos bodies in their proportions that transpire sensuality and island ethnicity, in a mythical and idyllic atmosphere.

Date of reception: On April 1, 1935, the act of reception is signed.

Observations: This work was part of the decoration of the building, commissioned to Miguel Martín Fernández de la Torre by the Casino by contract dated November 23, 1933, whose sketches were approved by the Board of Directors before the signing of the contract. In the breakdown of the overall budget foreseen for the entire ornamentation of the building, 50,000 pesetas are quoted for these paintings, with a completion period of 8 months from that date. Nestor’s participation in the design and organization of the Canarian procession in Madrid for the parade commemorating the anniversary of the Republic delayed the completion of these paintings. The work was carried out at the Gabinete Literario in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, with the collaboration of selected students from the Luján Pérez School, specifically in the transfer to canvas of gridded copies of the drawings previously traced by the artist, who made the appropriate retouches and the application of color. The artist himself placed the canvases, rectifying the measurements of the canvases and adding some lateral strips due to an error in the dimensions.

About the author: Néstor Martín – Fernández de la Torre (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria 1887- 1938), the most outstanding symbolist and modernist painter born in the Canary Islands, began his training as a disciple of Eliseo Meifrén in his native city, In 1902 the City Council granted him a scholarship to continue his studies in Madrid under the tutelage of Rafael Hidalgo de Caviedes and the great masters of the Prado Museum. His contact with painters such as Romero de Torres and Zuloaga, members of the café Levante, a meeting where he was introduced by his first teacher, was also very fruitful. He broadened his knowledge by visiting London in 1904, where he studied mainly Whistler and the Pre-Raphaelite painters, and the following year Paris, a city to which he became closely linked by joining one of its Masonic lodges. After two years of apprenticeship, in 1907 he established his studio in Barcelona and, through the Café Continental gathering, he became acquainted with the cultural world of the time, Rusiñol, Eugenio d’Ors, José M a Sert or Albéniz, among others. The success obtained with his decorative portraits in his first individual exhibition in the Equestrian Circle of that city (1908) gave him important commissions, such as the decoration of the Tibidabo Society, initiating his facet as a muralist in the decoration of his panels, exhibited in the Sala Parés in 1909. The Catalan period, which lasted until 1913, corresponds to the first stage of maturity of the painter within the symbolist style, with a first period of English influence, characterized by a decadentism with references to Rossetti or Burne Jones, and a second period of more clearly symbolist influence due to his entry into the Masonic world, with more heterogeneous continental contacts ranging from Klimt to Moreau, references to Renaissance artists, especially Leonardo da Vinci, and the aesthetics instilled in the Rosa Cruz salons. In this symbolism, born as a reaction to academic historicism or costumbrismo, with support in literature and music, based on the interpretation of myths or classical allegories along with the creation of new symbols, incorporates the modernist curvilinear rhythm and a provocative concept of sexuality, with interest in the androgynous nude, built with broad brushstrokes and impasto, influenced by Velázquez recovered, with a decorative sense and a great mastery of drawing. The second symbolist stage, from 1913 to 1928, was occupied by a single theme: the Poem of the Elements, the most ambitious project of Spanish symbolism, whose content is inspired by Freemasonry, which in turn takes it from the pre-Socratic thought of Empedocles, who unified the theories of water, together with air and fire, reflected in the Masonic opera The Magic Flute. To the element of water in the Poem of the Atlantic he dedicated eight frames, the Poem of the Earth also consists of eight, and probably he would have thought of the same structure for the poems of Fire and Air. He only finished Poema del Mar, which was exhibited in 1924 at the Palacio de La Biblioteca y Museos Nacionales in Madrid, the city where he took up residence in 1920, although again in 1928 he moved his studio to Paris. In this third stage of his production (1928 – 1938) his thematic series and scenographies stand out. 1929 is the year of his great scenographic performance in the opera Triana by Albéniz, and in Salomé by Strauss, making the following year the designs for the soprano María Kousnezof in Don Giovanni, those of Carmen and Manon.He had already made his work known in 1916 at the International Fine Arts Exhibition in Panama, at the Witcomb Gallery in Buenos Aires (1918 and 1930) and at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburg (USA) (1923 and 1926). This work as a set designer continued on the islands after his definitive return to the Canary Islands in 1934, with the set design for the Caballería rusticana for the Pérez Galdós theater, whose decoration he had done in 1928, the set design for La verbena de la paloma and Una noche romántica. His link with this theater led him to revive the Fiesta Pascual in 1938. His curiosity open to all artistic manifestations led him to approach multiple facets of art, such as the realization of posters, illustration of books and magazines, for example The Roses of Hercules by Tomás Morales, jewelry design, stained glass, ceramics and even fabrics. His work was also very important in the recovery of the popular manifestations of the Canary Islands, focused on creating a policy of attracting tourism, through the promotion of ethnographic values, both in architecture, landscape and flora, as well as in folk dances and festivities and crafts, especially materialized in projects such as the Pueblo Canario, the construction of the Santa Catalina hotel in Canarian style or the urbanization of Las Canteras beach. His early death in February 1938 cut short a life impregnated by art.

Bibliography:

Archives of the Casino de Tenerife Minutes J.D. March 3, 1994, p.122

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.

Pedro ALMEIDA CABRERA: Néstor Martín Fernández de la Torre. Vice-Ministry of Culture and Sports of the Government of the Canary Islands. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1991.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-earth-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/feed/ 0 Allegory of the Sea – Néstor Martín Fernández de la Torre https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-sea-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/ https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-sea-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:55:32 +0000 https://rctfe.com/allegory-of-the-sea-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/


  1. Type of work: Mural painting
  2. Technique: Oil on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: The central panel: 400 x 1000 cm. The sides: 400 x 330 cm
  4. Theme: Allegorical
  5. Title: Allegory of the Sea
  6. Author: Néstor Martín Fernández de la Torre (1887-1938)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1935
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Exaltation of the Canarian world following symbolist and aesthetic guidelines typical of modernism.

Description: The set formed by two great themes, El Mar en el testero sur and La Tierra en el testero norte, is all of it a song of exaltation in which the Canarian is glorified through the work of the island men and women. Both are conceived as triptychs distributed in three scenes that develop in compositional and thematic continuity, where with the elements of nature, previously studied in detail, as in the case of flora, he recreates a mythical and allegorical world of muscular men and women, of portentous anatomy. With a compositional complexity full of foreshortenings and a certain baroque style in the perspectives and in the dynamic tension achieved with a perfect mastery of drawing, mainly supported by the strength of the curved line, the sobriety and restraint of the color stands out. In both panels, distributed respectively in three scenes, the most festive content of the theme occupies the central part, presenting on the sides the images more related to work. In the painting dedicated to the sea, the central scene is a sailor’s parade of muscular men, like demigods, carrying a large boat, the central axis that drives the composition, accompanied by those who carry the buoys and the fisherwomen with baskets and trays with the fruits of the catch. On both sides are represented the works related to water, the salting of fish on the left and watering on the right that together with the row of earthenware jars located between white walls and lush philodendrons form a set of great plastic effect, which contrasts with the flora of cacti and cactus on the left side. In the panel La Tierra, again a pilgrimage scene occupies the central part, with peasant women riding camels led by peasants who cover their backs with the typical Esperanza blanket. The representation of bananas and men carrying baskets with tomatoes in the side scenes has been interpreted as a tribute to the new products that sustain the island’s agricultural economy, as opposed to the cycle of the cochineal that has already been overcome, to which the tuneras allude. The contrast between leisure and work is accompanied here by a greater attention given to the flora of cardons and piteras or the magnificent specimen of the dragon tree, symbol of the region, but also of fertility and long life. In this sense, the symbolic content of what is represented is very rich and varied; it has been identified as the contrast between north and south, or between the new and the old, also hiding a rich content of meanings in the symbolic language that each plant could contain. As for the treatment of the human being, he stands out for his beauty and ambiguity, with miguelanguelescos bodies in their proportions that transpire sensuality and island ethnicity, in a mythical and idyllic atmosphere.

Date of reception: On April 1, 1935, the act of reception is signed.

Observations: This work was part of the decoration of the building, commissioned to Miguel Martín Fernández de la Torre by the Casino by contract dated November 23, 1933, whose sketches were approved by the Board of Directors before the signing of the contract. In the breakdown of the overall budget foreseen for the entire ornamentation of the building, 50,000 pesetas are quoted for these paintings, with a completion period of 8 months from that date. Nestor’s participation in the design and organization of the Canarian procession in Madrid for the parade commemorating the anniversary of the Republic delayed the completion of these paintings. The work was carried out at the Gabinete Literario in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, with the collaboration of selected students from the Luján Pérez School, specifically in the transfer to canvas of gridded copies of the drawings previously traced by the artist, who made the appropriate retouches and the application of color. The artist himself placed the canvases, rectifying the measurements of the canvases and adding some lateral strips due to an error in the dimensions.

About the author: Néstor Martín – Fernández de la Torre (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria 1887- 1938), the most outstanding symbolist and modernist painter born in the Canary Islands, began his training as a disciple of Eliseo Meifrén in his native city, In 1902 the City Council granted him a scholarship to continue his studies in Madrid under the tutelage of Rafael Hidalgo de Caviedes and the great masters of the Prado Museum. His contact with painters such as Romero de Torres and Zuloaga, members of the café Levante, a meeting where he was introduced by his first teacher, was also very fruitful. He broadened his knowledge by visiting London in 1904, where he studied mainly Whistler and the Pre-Raphaelite painters, and the following year Paris, a city to which he became closely linked by joining one of its Masonic lodges. After two years of apprenticeship, in 1907 he established his studio in Barcelona and, through the Café Continental gathering, he became acquainted with the cultural world of the time, Rusiñol, Eugenio d’Ors, José M a Sert or Albéniz, among others. The success obtained with his decorative portraits in his first individual exhibition in the Equestrian Circle of that city (1908) gave him important commissions, such as the decoration of the Tibidabo Society, initiating his facet as a muralist in the decoration of his panels, exhibited in the Sala Parés in 1909. The Catalan period, which lasted until 1913, corresponds to the first stage of maturity of the painter within the symbolist style, with a first period of English influence, characterized by a decadentism with references to Rossetti or Burne Jones, and a second period of more clearly symbolist influence due to his entry into the Masonic world, with more heterogeneous continental contacts ranging from Klimt to Moreau, references to Renaissance artists, especially Leonardo da Vinci, and the aesthetics instilled in the Rosa Cruz salons. In this symbolism, born as a reaction to academic historicism or costumbrismo, with support in literature and music, based on the interpretation of myths or classical allegories along with the creation of new symbols, incorporates the modernist curvilinear rhythm and a provocative concept of sexuality, with interest in the androgynous nude, built with broad brushstrokes and impasto, influenced by Velázquez recovered, with a decorative sense and a great mastery of drawing. The second symbolist stage, from 1913 to 1928, was occupied by a single theme: the Poem of the Elements, the most ambitious project of Spanish symbolism, whose content is inspired by Freemasonry, which in turn takes it from the pre-Socratic thought of Empedocles, who unified the theories of water, together with air and fire, reflected in the Masonic opera The Magic Flute. To the element of water in the Poem of the Atlantic he dedicated eight frames, the Poem of the Earth also consists of eight, and probably he would have thought of the same structure for the poems of Fire and Air. He only finished Poema del Mar, which was exhibited in 1924 at the Palacio de La Biblioteca y Museos Nacionales in Madrid, the city where he took up residence in 1920, although again in 1928 he moved his studio to Paris. In this third stage of his production (1928 – 1938) his thematic series and scenographies stand out. 1929 is the year of his great scenographic performance in the opera Triana by Albéniz, and in Salomé by Strauss, making the following year the designs for the soprano María Kousnezof in Don Giovanni, those of Carmen and Manon.He had already made his work known in 1916 at the International Fine Arts Exhibition in Panama, at the Witcomb Gallery in Buenos Aires (1918 and 1930) and at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburg (USA) (1923 and 1926). This work as a set designer continued on the islands after his definitive return to the Canary Islands in 1934, with the set design for the Caballería rusticana for the Pérez Galdós theater, whose decoration he had done in 1928, the set design for La verbena de la paloma and Una noche romántica. His link with this theater led him to revive the Fiesta Pascual in 1938. His curiosity open to all artistic manifestations led him to approach multiple facets of art, such as the realization of posters, illustration of books and magazines, for example The Roses of Hercules by Tomás Morales, jewelry design, stained glass, ceramics and even fabrics. His work was also very important in the recovery of the popular manifestations of the Canary Islands, focused on creating a policy of attracting tourism, through the promotion of ethnographic values, both in architecture, landscape and flora, as well as in folk dances and festivities and crafts, especially materialized in projects such as the Pueblo Canario, the construction of the Santa Catalina hotel in Canarian style or the urbanization of Las Canteras beach. His early death in February 1938 cut short a life impregnated by art.

Bibliography:

Archives of the Casino de Tenerife Minutes J.D. March 3, 1994, p.122

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.

Pedro ALMEIDA CABRERA: Néstor Martín Fernández de la Torre. Vice-Ministry of Culture and Sports of the Government of the Canary Islands. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1991.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-sea-nestor-martin-fernandez-de-la-torre/feed/ 0 Friso Isleño – José Aguiar https://rctfe.com/en/friso-isleno-jose-aguiar/ https://rctfe.com/en/friso-isleno-jose-aguiar/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:50:15 +0000 https://rctfe.com/friso-isleno-jose-aguiar/

  1. Type of work: Mural painting
  2. Technique: Encaustic on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: 320 x 1136 cm
  4. Subject: Allegorical-indigenist
  5. Title: Friso Isleño
  6. Author: José de Aguiar (1895-1976)
  7. Chronology or Year: (1933-1941)
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Painting of regionalist character but in search of the expression of a Canarian identity (racial painting).

Description: It is a monumental composition, not so much for its dimensions but for the gigantism and monumentality of the figures in it. Set in an open stage with the sea in the background, the sea paradoxically becomes a narrow horizon due to the presence of the solid and powerful figures that build the space that surrounds and constrains them. Two scenes are represented, one agricultural and the other marine, symbols of the two pillars of the island’s economy at the time. On the right is the seafaring allegory: the sea as a means of work and subsistence in the farewell of the fisherman who departs in his boat. The two female nudes of robust women, lying on the rocks, isolated from the context, have been interpreted as a hedonistic vision of the sea. On the left he paints the peasant people, but not in the exaltation of their work, but in the moment of rest, of the siesta under the shade or exhibiting the fruits of their effort. They are muscular figures of humble workers, sturdy peasants with large feet and hands, powerful in their simplicity and dignity, but with a self-absorbed and melancholic expression. A silent solitude and stillness immobilizes the scene. This self-absorption is accentuated in the gaze of the dreamy adolescent, with his sailboat, the link between the two scenes. The work reveals a formal classicism, both for the compositional arrangement and for the solidity and plasticity of the figures sculpted with a vibrant and luminous palette of acid and intense colors, undoubtedly the result of his contact with the art of Masaccio or Michelangelo during his stay in Italy in 1930.

Date of receipt: 1941

Remarks: The work was commissioned by the Casino for the decoration of the lobby of its new building by means of a contract signed with the painter on December 9, 1933, in which the dimensions, the form of fragmentation, the payment stipulated at 19,000 pesetas and the deadline for execution were fixed. Although the work should have been finished in five months (May 1934), the delay on the part of the artist in its execution, its exhibition in Madrid and Paris in 1936 after due authorization by the Casino and the loss of the canvases – which should have been transferred to Tenerife from Alicante – due to the outbreak of the Civil War, led to their arrival at their destination in August 1941, when the artist himself placed them on the wall of the lobby, for which he had been transferred expressly from Madrid. The work was finally assembled on September 18, 1941, and a special party was organized for the occasion for the members of the organization.

Restorations: Although four years after its inauguration the first alarm was raised, probably due to problems caused by the installation, it was in 1978 when it was restored by Waldo Aguiar, the author’s son and also a painter by profession, due to the wrinkles and bagging of the canvas caused by deficiencies in the installation and lighting.

About the author: José Aguiar García (Vueltas de Santa Clara, Cuba,1895- Madrid, 1976), born in Cuba into a family of emigrants, soon returned to La Gomera where he was baptized in the parish of San Marcos de Agulo. He went to Madrid in 1914 to study Law, but abandoned his studies to study Fine Arts at the School of Fine Arts of San Fernando as a disciple of José Pinazo Martínez (1879 – 1938), continuing his training in Florence with a scholarship from the Cabildo Insular de La Gomera. In contact with Renaissance art (especially Masaccio and Michelangelo), he discovers the beauty of the nude and the encaustic technique that he will use for the first time in the Friso Isleño del Casino de Tenerife and will use from then on in his large murals. Since 1920, he has been participating in the National Exhibitions, obtaining a third medal in 1926 for Figures of the gold medal in 1929 for the Women of the Souththe medal of honor for Estío in 1944 and the gold medal of the Círculo de Bellas Artes of Madrid in 1934 with Nude seated. In 1959 he was named member of the Hispanic Society of America and in 1960 of the Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino of Tenerife: Contract-writing between Faustino Martín Albertos and José Aguiar for the execution of the Friso Isleño.

Carmen Nieves CRESPO DE LAS CASAS: José Aguiar, his life and work. Aula de Cultura del Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1975.

Ángeles ABAD: José Aguiar. Viceconsejería de Cultura y Deportes del Gobierno de Canarias, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1991.

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.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/friso-isleno-jose-aguiar/feed/ 0 Canary Home – Ángel Romero Mateos https://rctfe.com/en/canary-home-angel-romero-mateos/ https://rctfe.com/en/canary-home-angel-romero-mateos/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:45:58 +0000 https://rctfe.com/canary-home-angel-romero-mateos/


  1. Type of work: Large format easel painting
  2. Technique: Oil on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: Pending measurements due to inaccessibility
  4. Subject: Domestic interior
  5. Title: Canary home
  6. Author: Ángel Romero Mateos (1875-1965)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1890
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: It is genre painting, within the costumbrista tradition of the last third of the 19th century.

Description: This is an interior painting depicting a scene of daily life in a Canarian home. In an atmosphere of semi-darkness, some characters watch over the sleep of a child: from left to right, two seated women, a standing woman who is ironing, and an old man sitting with his back to the viewer occupies the foreground. They all surround the cradle where the child lies, the central element of the circular composition with which the painting is constructed and the characters and objects are distributed. The luminous effects achieved by the treatment of the light that enters directly from the outside through the half-open door located at the back of the room, but illuminating only part of the scene, while the rest is in shadow or under the light filtered by the red curtain of the window located on the left wall, which manages to highlight the objects, especially the white of the sheets and recreate the intimacy of the moment. The clothing and the type of headdress worn by the characters, as well as the furniture that adorns the humble room – the chiguerguera chair, the type of cradle, the wicker basket, etc. – demonstrate the taste for the exaltation of the Canary Islands, so characteristic of the costumbrista painting of the period indicated.

Date of receipt: It became part of the patrimony of the Casino de Tenerife in 1907, according to the Memory read at the General Meeting of December 27, 1907 (point 17), which indicates that it was ceded, “almost given” by the artist himself.

Observations: In the documentation of the casino it has appeared under the title “The three generations” until the publication of the book El Casino de Tenerife (1840 – 1990).where Professor Alberto Darias Príncipe corrects this error, since the work was presented with the title “Hogar canario” in the National Exhibition of Fine Arts of 1901, as it appears in the catalog of the same, occasion in which it was awarded with the Consideration of Third Class Medal.

Restorations: Already in 1980 and in view of the situation of this canvas, Mr. Opelio Rodríguez Peña, then President of the Casino, expressed his concern and suggested the convenience of informing Mr. Rafael Delgado about it. A restoration was carried out by Isabel Concepción Rodríguez, concluded in the first months of 1988 to the satisfaction of the Board of Directors. It is listed in the Casino’s inventory as No. 0244. This painting participated in the exhibition VENTANA AL ARTE, organized by the Cabildo Insular de Tenerife, curated by Luis Ortega Abrahan and held at the Auditorio de Tenerife from March 15 to April 13, 2007.

About the author: Ángel Romero Mateo (Cádiz 1875- Santa Cruz de Tenerife 1965), born in Cádiz, moved to Tenerife with his family in 1880, where he took up residence. He received his training at the Academia de Bellas Artes de Cádiz and at the Real Academia de San Fernando in Madrid, where he also attended the studio of Manuel Domínguez and Joaquín Sorolla from 1899 onwards. Three periods are established in his production: the first (1895-1902), with a predominance of the chiaroscuro range, the second marked by the influence of Sorolla, where he clarifies the palette and pays special attention to light, and a third period, after abandoning painting for 40 years to attend to family business, between 1949-1954, in which he mainly painted landscapes. He participated on three occasions in the National Exhibitions, where his work did not go unnoticed, deserving both in 1901 and 1904 the consideration of Third Class Medal.

Bibliography:

Archives of the Casino de Tenerife: Minutes of the Board of Directors: 24-4-1980, page 111; 21-4-1988, page 25. Correspondence between Ricardo Melchior Navarro, president of the Cabildo Insular de Tenerife and Domingo Febles Padrón, then president of the Casino de Tenerife regarding the loan of the painting Hogar canario for the exhibition Ventana Al Arte. Fernando CASTRO BORREGO: Ángel Romero Mateos. Analysis of costumbrismo in Canarian painting. Servicio de Publicaciones de la Caja de Ahorros y Monte de Piedad. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1976.

Agustín GUIMERÁ RAVINA, Alberto DARIAS PRÍNCIPE: El Casino de Tenerife (1840- 1990.) Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1992.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/canary-home-angel-romero-mateos/feed/ 0 César Manrique Mural https://rctfe.com/en/cesar-manrique-mural/ https://rctfe.com/en/cesar-manrique-mural/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:40:56 +0000 https://rctfe.com/cesar-manrique-mural/

  1. Type of work: Ceramic mural
  2. Technique: Ceramic and glass mosaic
  3. Approximate dimensions: Pending due to inaccessibility
  4. Subject: Abstract composition
  5. Title: Untitled
  6. Author: César Manrique (1919-1992)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1957
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Geometric abstraction

Description: This mural stands out for the procedure used by means of which the matter contained within geometric schemes has become the sustaining element of its expressiveness. The interweaving of lines orders the space and builds the forms, and it is the different materials used, pieces of ceramic, tiles, glazed earthenware, glass, etc., that integrate the color that emanates from their own nature. The combination of these different materials, delimited by the drawing, provides the shades and tones that go from ochre to black, white, earth, blue and green, modifying the color according to the zonal supports.

Date of reception: In 1957, forming part of the decoration of the new space dedicated to summer terrace, inaugurated in August of that year.

Observations: Under the presidency of Gumersindo Robayna Galván, in order to create a more informal social space for youth, the transformation of the rooftop into a summer terrace was approved in 1955. The architectural work was commissioned to the architect Luis Cabrera who, recently arrived in Tenerife, represented the architectural renovation by applying the international modern style to the new space, whose decoration was entrusted to César Manrique, who was already successful as a painter and collaborated successfully with architects in interior decoration, especially as a muralist (mural of the Parador de Turismo in Arrecife in 1950, mural of the grill of the Hotel Fénix in Madrid or of the Banco Guipuzcoano in Santander in 1955). On this occasion, César’s mural was placed at the back of the bar. At the end of the 1980s, with the renovation of the fourth floor by architect Carlos Schwartz, it was moved to the left side of the new access to the terrace, where it is today. On June 6, 1957, the Board of Directors “agreed to pay César Manrique the amount of 50,000 ptas. on account of the 70,000 ptas. agreed for the project, direction and stay for the decoration of the Summer Terrace”.

About the author: César Manrique (Arrecife, Lanzarote, 1919 – Tahíche, Lanzarote, 1992), gifted with a great ability for drawing, began his training in a self-taught way, influenced by the observation of the craft activity, then abundant in Puerto Naos, the work of Picasso, Matisse and Braque, known through magazines, the contact with the Millares family when he moved to Lanzarote in 1936 and the friendship with the sculptor Pancho Lasso from 1939. After a solo exhibition in 1942 and participation in the collective exhibition of artists from the province of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria at the National Museum of Modern Art in 1944, he obtained a scholarship from the General Captaincy of the Canary Islands to continue his studies in Madrid, at the Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando under Vázquez Díaz and Eduardo de Chicharro, where he remained between 1945 and 1950. In this first stage of his production (1945-1954), the insular imaginary, with which he had already established a full identification, moves away from naturalism in search of the synthesis and essence of reality, with a plastic language influenced by Picasso in drawing and Matisse in color. Replacing figurative references with secret signs, a series of monotypes exhibited in 1954 at the Clan Gallery in Madrid places him within the group of artists with avant-garde ideas for the renovation of Spanish art after the Civil War. More than the content, the procedure used now stands out, with exclusive use of plastic elements, where in a pro-constructivist conception the line traces geometric shapes, treating color as the most significant element of the work. His stay in Paris in 1953, where he carried out research on non-figurative painting, led him to a second stage of austerity (1954 – 1957), in which there was a break with color and matter, within geometric schemes, began to become the main element supporting the expressiveness of the painting. This process of investigation of matter and forms leads to a stage of maturity that begins in 1958, when geometric schemes disappear and it is the matter that only assumes the significance of the painting, which also recovers the previous color as part of its nature. His work, shown in individual exhibitions at the Clan Gallery in Madrid, soon achieved recognition crystallized in the 2nd Medal of the 1st Contemporary Art Exhibition in Cartagena, and in his participation in the XXVIII Venice Biennial and in the III Hispano-American Biennial in Havana in 1955. That year he was commissioned to decorate the Hotel Fénix in Madrid, thus continuing with the muralist activity begun in 1950 in the Parador de Turismo de Arrecife and in other companies such as the Banco Guipuzcoano de Santander (1955), in the Barajas Airport or the mural commissioned by the Casino de Tenerife in 1957, the year in which he exhibited his work in that society, highly praised by the critics, who considered him the most decorative “abstractionist” of the moment. In 1960 his work had already been shown in the main European art centers, continuing with his solo exhibitions in Madrid and Paris and participating again in the Venice Biennale. In 1964 he travels to New York at the invitation of Nelson Rockefeller, settling in that city the following year with a scholarship from the New York International Institute of Education for the study of American art. His contact with New York’s cultural life and with American artistic currents – abstract expressionism, pop, kinetic art – was of great importance for all his creative facets, not only for painting, but also for sculpture, murals and spatial interventions. Hired exclusively by the prestigious Catherine Viviano Gallery, where he exhibited three times, in his paintings he uses action painting techniques (dripping, calligraphic signs, gestural splashes) and they begin to receive names of places or geographical features of Lanzarote as a reinforcement of its abstract character, as they are subject to any interpretation. Despite the frenetic cultural activity offered by New York, a spiritual need and the ever-present presence of Lanzarote in his memory forced him to return and take up permanent residence on the island. He then began his work of intervention in the space of his island, threatened at that time by the tourist avalanche. Aware of the importance of incorporating Lanzarote in the development of this sector but without despoiling its natural landscape, its main source of wealth, he had the ability to incorporate in the same company the production of elements for tourism consumption and the conservation of the landscape, creating a model image of identification of man with the environment. For this work, which had the unconditional support of the Island Council, he won the World Prize for Ecology and Tourism in Berlin (1978), the Europa Nostra Award (1980) and the declaration of Lanzarote as a World Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO in 1993. His interest in urban planning and architecture, already evident in his association with architects for the decoration of murals, led him to rescue the cultural and natural values of the island and to design an itinerary that would regulate the use and enjoyment of the landscape, providing it with spaces for its contemplation, such as Jameos del Agua, Mirador del Río, Taro de Tahíche, or La Peña in El Hierro, with a perfect synthesis of local tradition and modernity in harmony with the environment. That ideology he called art-nature/nature-art and his fight against the degradation of the coastline explains his intervention in Costa Martiánez in 1970, Playa Jardín in 1990 or in the Hotel Salinas and La Vaguada in 1983, without ever abandoning his facet as a painter. From the sixties onwards, color recovers the intensity of previous periods and at the end of the seventies he incorporates figurative and allegorical references, his paintings always open to diverse expressive possibilities, as is also the case with his sculptures, most of them designed for his spatial interventions. His art, which integrates all his creative potential, was always at the service of life, cut short by a traffic accident in September 1992.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife. Minutes J D of June 6, 1957; September 5, 1957. 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.

Fernando RUIZ GORDILLO: César Manrique, César Manrique Foundation, Madrid, 1998 (4th edition).

Lázaro SANTANA: Manrique. Art of the Canary Islands Edirca, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1991 Lázaro SANTANA: César Manrique. An art for life. Barcelona 1993

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/cesar-manrique-mural/feed/ 0 Teide – Manuel Martín González https://rctfe.com/en/teide-manuel-martin-gonzalez/ https://rctfe.com/en/teide-manuel-martin-gonzalez/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:35:01 +0000 https://rctfe.com/teide-manuel-martin-gonzalez/

  1. Type of work: Large format easel painting
  2. Technique: Oil on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: 210 x 198 cm
  4. Subject: Landscape
  5. Title: Teide
  6. Author: Manuel Martín González (1905-1988)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1955
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Landscape painting, based on the observation and direct contact with nature, retained by means of sketches, later on in the studio, within the plainarist tradition, but looking for the natural expression and the identification with the environment.

Description: This is a wide panoramic view of the landscape of Las Cañadas with Teide in the background, where the rocky masses and vegetation characteristic of the foreground area lead to the geographical monumentality of the majestic volcano that stands, isolated in space, dominating the scene. For the construction of the painting he has based it on a series of diagonal lines, which follow one after the other, crossing each other – distributing the vegetation and marking the rocky slopes – and converge in the great triangle of the Teide in the background, cut out of the sky, flanked by horizontally distributed clouds. The color, given in short and loose brushstrokes, is the one that configures and graduates the depth of the space. From the combination of luminous yellows, ochres and greens with darker touches in the foreground to the browns and greens of the rocky masses, to gradually lighten the palette towards the background, where the gray and bluish tones fix the distance and capture the atmosphere and blue haze so characteristic of the landscape of La Cañadas at certain times of the day.

Date of reception: In 1955 it became part of the Casino’s patrimony and was officially commissioned to the artist by this institution after the success obtained by the set of Teide and Los Azulejos made in 1948 for the “Bar Atlántico”, built on the first floor of the building.

Observations: This table also appears under the title Las Cañadas del Teide in the monograph by Dra. Carmen Fraga González on the painter in the year 200 According to his biographer, for the realization of this painting the artist moved to Las Cañadas for a week, used a cave to sleep in and took eight sketches in direct contact with nature.

About the author: A native of Guía de Isora, Tenerife, he began his training at the drawing academy of sculptor Germán Compañ in La Laguna, continuing it with Teodomiro Robayna in Santa Cruz. His period of work in the lithography of Angel Romero allowed him to learn the techniques of engraving and printing, experience that he would exploit as an advertising artist for his livelihood during his stay in Cuba (1923 – 1932), where he also participated in the exhibitions of the Canary Association with good critical acclaim. On his return to Tenerife, he settled in Guía de Isora and began to paint the southern landscape of Las Cañadas, works that he presented at the Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture of Canarian Artists at the Círculo de Bellas Artes in 1932. His move to Santa Cruz de Tenerife in 1942 allowed him to approach the capital’s cultural circles and participate in the Exhibition of Tenerife artists held in Madrid, sponsored by the Directorate General of Fine Arts and the Cabildo Insular de Tenerife, where his paintings were exhibited. Chirche Village was acquired by the Museum of Modern Art. His greatest artistic achievements were in the decade of 1946-1956 with the official commissions for the Hotel Mencey, the General Captaincy, the canvas for the Casino and the two landscapes of the Basilica of Candelaria (1959). In 1963 he became president of the Painting Section of the Círculo de Bellas Artes and in 1971 he was named corresponding member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences of San Juan de Puerto Rico, continuing with his artistic work and participation in exhibitions until a few months before his death in September 1988.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife

Carmen Nieves CRESPO DE LAS CASAS: The Canarian landscape painter Martín González. Aula de Cultura del Cabildo Insular de Tenerife, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1980.

María del Carmen FRAGA GONZÁLEZ: Manuel Martín González. Library of Canarian Artists, Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports, Government of the Canary Islands, 2000.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/teide-manuel-martin-gonzalez/feed/ 0 Woman and rose – Cristino de Vera https://rctfe.com/en/woman-and-rose-cristino-de-vera/ https://rctfe.com/en/woman-and-rose-cristino-de-vera/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:30:22 +0000 https://rctfe.com/woman-and-rose-cristino-de-vera/


  1. Type of work: Easel painting
  2. Technique: Pending
  3. Approximate dimensions: 99 x 80 cm
  4. Theme: Intimate with a marked mystical character.
  5. Title: Woman and rose
  6. Author: Cristino de Vera (*1931)
  7. Chronology or Year: Signed in 1977, but completed in 1981.
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Within the figurative style, it is not a mimetic reference to reality, since it refers to a hidden design.

Description. The figure of a woman, whose expressiveness is supported by her hands clasped together holding a rose, seems to float in an abstract setting. The apparent simplicity of the representation hides a compositional complexity, where the coexistence of different vanishing points creates an ambiguous and fractured space. A geometric composition of chromatic planes, where the vertical frontal stripe is opposed to the lateral foreshortening of another plane, reduces the background to two-dimensionality, to autonomous color fields delimited by the line; to this pictorial plane he contrasts the spaciousness suggested by the drawing in the construction of the figure, a drawing that is nevertheless hidden by the application of color like the weft of a fabric, creating a homogeneous texture where there is no atmospheric perspective or distance. This ambiguity is accentuated by the treatment of light, which is not at the service of reality but rather its transfiguration. With short, dry brushstrokes, it is the white background of the painting that lightens the chromatic mass and brings out the light from within, expanding over the entire surface, underlining the silence and emptiness in which the female figure is suspended, petrified. The contrast of planes has been interpreted as an allegory of an unreconciled, fragmented world, an environment in which the solitary, static woman evokes, in a serene attitude, the eternal wait for reconciliation.

Date of reception: The work was acquired by the Casino during the presidency of Don Opelio Rodríguez Peña. (1979 – 1989)

Observations: In 1977, date of execution of the painting, Cristino Vera makes a solo exhibition at the Municipal Museum of Fine Arts of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and the following year participates in Collective both in Tenerife and Las Palmas. His presence in the Canary Islands in these exhibitions was perhaps the occasion that motivated the acquisition by the Casino of one of his works for its collection.

About the Author: Born on December 15, 1931, Cristino de Vera began his training in 1946, at the Escuela de Artes y Oficios Artísticos in his hometown under the teachings of Mariano Cossío, complementing it with drawing classes at the studio of sculptor Alfonso Reyes, and continuing them in Madrid in 1951 with Daniel Vázquez Díaz, classes at the Escuela de Bellas Artes de San Fernando and frequent visits to the Prado. In 1954 he had his first individual exhibition at the Galería Estilo in Madrid, for which he was presented by José Ma Moreno. From then on, his work was periodically shown individually or in group exhibitions, such as the one at the Museo Nacional de Arte Contemporáneo in Madrid in 1959, before traveling to France and Italy with a scholarship from the March Foundation in 1960. In 1961 he participated in the II Paris Biennial, the following year in the Venice Biennial and in 1964 with the Spanish pavilion at the New York Fair. With an iconographic style configured already at the end of the fifties, his work acquires a coherence that he will maintain throughout his career, in which his vital coherence has found the way to express itself, in a full identification with his work. The Theo Gallery in Madrid became the setting for his subsequent exhibitions, with prologues by intellectuals of the time, including, among others, the intervention of Gerardo Diego in the 1968 show. In 1971 he held his first anthological exhibition at the Caja de Ahorros de Santa Cruz (in La Laguna) with texts by Pedro González, Jesús Hernández Perera, Domingo Pérez Minik, Enrique Lite and Julio Tovar. His art soon transcended borders and in 1973 his work was exhibited at the Suillerot Gallery in Paris and the following year at the Rutland Gallery in London. Trips to the Far East, India, Brazil or the USSR enriched his spirituality and gave his work a higher profile, shown in a second anthology organized by the City Council of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria in the Castillo de La Luz, in 1976, exhibited the following year in the Municipal Museum of Fine Arts of Santa Cruz de Tenerife. In his hometown he exhibited again in 1985, this time at Magda Lázaro’s gallery with which he attended Arco in 1990, repeating in 1992 and 1994, both times with the Madrid gallery La Máquina Española. In 1996 his artistic career was awarded with the Gold Medal of the Canary Islands, followed by the National Prize of Plastic Arts received in 1998, awards that culminated with the Gold Medal of Fine Arts in 2002.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife

Ramón SALAS LAMAMIÈ DE CLAIRAC: Cristino de Vera. Vice-Ministry of Culture and Sports. Government of the Canary Islands, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 2002.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/woman-and-rose-cristino-de-vera/feed/ 0 Allegory of the Earth – Francisco Borges Salas https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-earth-francisco-borges-salas/ https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-earth-francisco-borges-salas/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:25:44 +0000 https://rctfe.com/allegory-of-the-earth-francisco-borges-salas/

  1. Type of work: Sculpture
  2. Technique: Stone carving
  3. Approximate dimensions: 205 x 53 x 51 cm
  4. Theme: Allegorical
  5. Title: Allegory of the Earth
  6. Author: Francisco Borges Salas (1901-1994)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1935
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Following the regionalist tendency of the time, within a realism there is a stylistic mixture of a schematic classical language together with a certain expressionism, to which symbolist elements are added.

Description: It is the representation of one of the pillars of the island, the earth, symbolized in the full body nude of a young woman, who in frontal position stands on a plinth. His head is covered with a peasant-style scarf, which he holds in his right hand, while in the hand of his left arm, extended along his side, he carries a series of fruits allegorical to his identification. It highlights the perfect knowledge of the volumes that make up the compact and rounded image, whose robustness and a certain statism give it serenity and timelessness.

Date of receipt: Around 1936

Observations: The work was commissioned together with the Sea by contract dated May 15, 1934 signed by Borges Salas and the then president of the Casino, Faustino Martín Albertos. It specifies the size and material of the sculptures (2 meters in Almarquir stone, executed in a single block), which should be two female nudes, whose sketch needed to have the approval of the Board before its final execution. Likewise, the execution time was set at two years and the payment of the order was determined at 15,000 pesetas, distributed in different installments. Together with a series of vases, the two sculptures were intended to decorate the main hall. His nudity attracted attention, to the point that in 1943, on the occasion of the presence of the Captain General of the Canary Islands, Francisco García Escámez e Iniesta with the first authorities of the Island, among which were the Bishop Fray Albino González, the President of the Cabildo, Francisco La Roche Aguilar, the President of the Audiencia, Luis Vallejo Quero, the Deputy Provincial Chief of the Movement Joaquín Amigó Lara and Colonel Lorenzo Machado Méndez y Fernández de Lugo, the President of the Audiencia, Luis Vallejo Quero, the Deputy Provincial Chief of the Movement Joaquín Amigó de Lara and Colonel Lorenzo Machado Méndez y Fernández de Lugo, then President of the Casino and host of the event, the censorship of the time tried to cover the bodies of the sculptures, which was opposed by the Board of Directors.

About the author: Francisco Borges Salas (Santa Cruz de Tenerife 1901 – 1994), began his training at the School of Arts and Crafts in his hometown, where he received drawing classes from Pedro Tarquis Soria, being his first teacher in sculpture Guzman Companys in his studio in La Laguna. In 1920 he went to Madrid where he continued his apprenticeship with Victorio Macho (1887-1966), interrupted in 1921 by the need to fulfill the Military Service, participating in the war of Africa with the 64th Infantry Regiment. In 1925 he travels to Paris where he attends the workshop of Antoine Bourdelle (1861 – 1929) and comes in contact with the artistic world of the time: Dali, Picasso, Oscar Dominguez, Isadora Duncan, etc. Back to Tenerife, in 1930 he obtained the position of professor of drawing at the School of Arts and Crafts and developed a great creative work both in sculpture and painting, participating in the Venice Biennale in 1936 and making wood carvings for the Quinta Canaria in Havana, the busts of Dr. Zerolo and José Tabares Bartlet in La Laguna and the sculptural group of Fertility in the García Sanabria Park, in 1938. For political reasons he was dismissed from his teaching post in 1937, which led him to self-exile in Venezuela, together with his brother Miguel and their respective families, where he arrived in December 1941 and remained until 1962. There he worked for ten years at the head of the design and propaganda department of the Ministry of Health, winning in 1950 the international competition for the decoration of the Assembly Hall of the Military Academy of Caracas, with five oil paintings on the country’s heroes and military campaigns. On his return to his homeland, in 1972 he became a full member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Miguel Arcángel, holding an anthological exhibition in the Sala de la Caja Canarias in La Laguna in 1973. In 1983 the Círculo de Amistad XII de Enero organized another exhibition and in 1988 the Viceconsejería de Cultura y Deportes del Gobierno de Canarias, as part of “Maestros del siglo XX,” organized another anthological exhibition, presented in the two Canary capitals and curated by Eliseo Izquierdo. In 1993 he received the Gold Medal of the Canary Islands and the appointment of Favorite Son of Santa Cruz de Tenerife; a year before an exhibition in honor of the artist was held at the Círculo de Amistad XII de Enero.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife

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.

Carlos PÉREZ REYES: Contemporary Canarian sculpture (1918 – 1978). Island Council of Gran Canaria. Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1984. http://www,spanishprintmakers.com/spanish/borges2.htm.26/04/2009 http://www.sociedadcentroicodense.com/html/galeria-artistas-borges.html. 26/04/2009

Eliseo IZQUIERDO PÉREZ: “Borges Salas, Francisco” in Gran Enciclopedia Canaria. Ediciones Canarias. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1994,p.638 (T.III)

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-earth-francisco-borges-salas/feed/ 0 Allegory of the Sea – Francisco Borges Salas https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-sea-francisco-borges-salas/ https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-sea-francisco-borges-salas/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:20:41 +0000 https://rctfe.com/allegory-of-the-sea-francisco-borges-salas/


  1. Type of work: Sculpture
  2. Technique: Stone carving
  3. Approximate dimensions: 205 x 64 x 50 cm
  4. Theme: Allegorical
  5. Title: Allegory of the Sea
  6. Author: Francisco Borges Salas (1901-1994)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1935
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Following the regionalist tendency of the moment, within a realism there is a stylistic mixture of a schematic classical language with a certain expressionist vision, to which are added symbolist elements.

Description: A full-bodied female nude, with her arms falling along her body, is presented standing upright on a plinth, holding in her right hand a conch shell, the only symbolic detail alluding to the allegory of the sea, an element to which Borges resorts, together with the earth, for the representation of the Islands in the two sculptures commissioned for the decoration of the main hall of the Casino in 1934. Unlike in La Tierra, a long hair crowns her head, endowing the figure, of full and rounded forms, with a certain staticism, timelessness and sensuality.

Observations: The work was commissioned, along with the Earth, by contract dated May 15, 1934 signed by Borges Salas and the then president of the Casino, Faustino Martín Albertos. It specifies the size and material of the sculptures (2 meters in Almarquir stone, executed in a single block), which should be two female nudes, whose sketch needed to have the approval of the Board before its final execution. Likewise, the execution time was set at two years and the payment of the order was determined at 15,000 pesetas, distributed in different installments. Together with a series of vases, the two sculptures were intended to decorate the main hall. His nudity attracted attention, to the point that in 1943, on the occasion of the presence in the mentioned stay of the Captain General of the Canary Islands, Francisco García Escámez e Iniesta with the first authorities of the Island, among which were the Bishop Fray Albino González, the President of the Cabildo, Francisco La Roche Aguilar, the President of the Audiencia, Luis Vallejo Quero, the Deputy Provincial Chief of the Movement, Joaquín Amigó Lara and Colonel Lorenzo Machado Méndez y Fernández de Lugo, the President of the Audiencia, Luis Vallejo Quero, the Deputy Provincial Chief of the Movement Joaquín Amigó de Lara and Colonel Lorenzo Machado Méndez y Fernández de Lugo, then President of the Casino and host of the event, the censorship of the time tried to cover the bodies of the sculptures, which was opposed by the Board of Directors.

About the author: Francisco Borges Salas (Santa Cruz de Tenerife 1901 – 1994), began his training at the School of Arts and Crafts in his hometown where he received drawing classes from Pedro Tarquis Soria, being his first teacher in sculpture Guzman Companys in his studio in La Laguna. In 1920 he went to Madrid where he continued his apprenticeship with Victorio Macho (1887-1966), interrupted in 1921 by the need to fulfill his Military Service, participating in the war of Africa with the 64th Infantry Regiment. In 1925 he travels to Paris where he attends the workshop of Antoine Bourdelle (1861 – 1929) and comes in contact with the artistic world of the time: Dali, Picasso, Oscar Dominguez, Isadora Duncan, etc. On his return to Tenerife in 1930, he obtained the position of professor of drawing at the School of Arts and Crafts and developed a great creative work both in sculpture and painting, participating in the Venice Biennial in 1936 and making wood carvings for the Quinta Canaria in Havana, the busts of Dr. Zerolo and José Tabares Bartlet in La Laguna and the sculptural group of the Fecundidad in the García Sanabria Park in 1938. For political reasons he was dismissed from his teaching post in 1937, which led him to self-exile in Venezuela, together with his brother Miguel and their respective families, where he arrived in December 1941 and remained until 1962. There he worked for ten years at the head of the design and propaganda department of the Ministry of Health, winning in 1950 the international competition for the decoration of the Assembly Hall of the Military Academy of Caracas, with five oil paintings on the country’s heroes and military campaigns. On his return to his homeland, in 1972 he became a full member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Miguel Arcángel, holding an anthological exhibition in the Sala de la Caja Canarias in La Laguna in 1973. In 1983 the Círculo de Amistad XII de Enero organized another exhibition and in 1988 the Viceconsejería de Cultura y Deportes del Gobierno de Canarias, as part of “Maestros del siglo XX” organized another anthological exhibition, presented in the two Canary capitals and curated by Eliseo Izquierdo. In 1993 he received the Gold Medal of the Canary Islands and the appointment of Favorite Son of Santa Cruz de Tenerife; a year before an exhibition in honor of the artist was held at the Círculo de Amistad XII de Enero.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife

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.

Carlos PÉREZ REYES: Contemporary Canarian sculpture (1918 – 1978). Island Council of Gran Canaria. Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1984. http://www,spanishprintmakers.com/spanish/borges2.htm.26/04/2009 http://www.sociedadcentroicodense.com/html/galeria-artistas-borges.html. 26/04/2009

Eliseo IZQUIERDO PÉREZ: “Borges Salas, Francisco” in Gran Enciclopedia Canaria. Ediciones Canarias. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1994,p.638 (T.III)

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/allegory-of-the-sea-francisco-borges-salas/feed/ 0 Pageboy of Louis XIII – Manuel González Méndez https://rctfe.com/en/pageboy-of-louis-xiii-manuel-gonzalez-mendez/ https://rctfe.com/en/pageboy-of-louis-xiii-manuel-gonzalez-mendez/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:15:51 +0000 https://rctfe.com/pageboy-of-louis-xiii-manuel-gonzalez-mendez/

  1. Type of work: Easel painting
  2. Technique: Oil on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: 73 x 55 cm
  4. Subject: Portrait
  5. Title: Pageboy of Louis XIII
  6. Author: Manuel González Méndez (1845-1909)
  7. Chronology or Year: 19th Century
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Cabinet painting, within the classicist tradition and academic perfectionism, which characterizes the French painting of the second half of the 19th century.

Iconography: With great virtuosity in the correctness of the drawing and in the treatment of light and color, he recreates a portrait of 1⁄2 body in 3/4 position slightly turned to the left of a richly attired adolescent, with a profusely pleated neck ruff. The precious treatment of the set stands out, especially of the clothing in terms of texture and color, reflecting the elegance and delicacy of the French taste of the time.

Date of reception: It became part of the patrimony of the Casino of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in 1907, ceded “almost as a gift” by the artist himself, according to the Memory read at the General Meeting of December 27, 1907.

Observations: This is probably the same work entitled Un page sous Louis XIII with which in 1902 González Méndez participated in the Paris Salon. In 1994, the painting was loaned to the company, at the request of Sr. Mayor of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, for the exhibition Manuel González Méndez o el lenguaje de la luz, held at the Museo Municipal de Bellas Artes, from July 13 to September 15, 1994, on the occasion of the Fundación de Santa Cruz Cinco Siglos, curated by Gerardo Fuentes.

About the author: Manuel González Méndez (Santa Cruz de la Palma 1843 – Barcelona 1909) began his studies at the Provincial Academy of Fine Arts of Tenerife with Valentín Sanz, Filiberto Lallier and Nicolás Alfaro, extending them from 1870 in Paris, where he was taught by Leon Gerome (1824 – 1904) at the Academy of Fine Arts of that city. Already in 1875 his work obtained a special mention at the Universal Exhibition in Paris, participating periodically in the Parisian Salons, reaping success and honors: in 1889 the title of Knight of the Royal Order of Isabel the Catholic and Officer of the Academy of Fine Arts in Paris and Cross of the Legion of Honor in 1898. In 1900 he returned to the islands, set up his studio in Santa Cruz de Tenerife and in 1904 obtained the Chair of Modeling and Decorative Composition at the Municipal School of Drawing in that city. Although he cultivated all genres, he is the main representative of Canarian costumbrismo of the 19th century, standing out as a portraitist due to his technical mastery and his ability to penetrate the soul of the characters.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife. Book of General Meetings, Session of December 27, 1907; Minutes of the Board of Directors, June 16, 1994, pp.125.

Faly GUTIÉRREZ: Manuel González Méndez 1843 – 1909, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1978. M.Á. ALLOZA MORENO: Manuel González Méndez, Library of Canary Artists no 6, Viceconsejería de Cultura y Deportes, Government of the Canary Islands, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1995. Agustín GUIMERÁ RAVINA, Alberto DARIAS PRÍNCIPE: El Casino de Tenerife 1840 – 1990, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1992.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/pageboy-of-louis-xiii-manuel-gonzalez-mendez/feed/ 0 “Sketch” of the Island Frieze – José Aguiar https://rctfe.com/en/sketch-of-the-island-frieze-jose-aguiar/ https://rctfe.com/en/sketch-of-the-island-frieze-jose-aguiar/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:10:41 +0000 https://rctfe.com/sketch-of-the-island-frieze-jose-aguiar/


  1. Type of work: Easel painting
  2. Technique: Mixed on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: 75 x 200 cm
  4. Theme: Allegorical
  5. Title: “Sketch” of the Island Frieze
  6. Author: José Aguiar García (1895-1976)
  7. Chronology or Year: 1933
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Regionalist painting, in search of the expression of the Canarian identity (racial painting).

Description: Following the indications given by the then president of the Casino, Mr. Faustino Martín Albertos, the sketch depicts a Canarian theme: the two pillars of the economy of the islands in a balanced composition, where the peasant scene on the left forms a whole with the seafaring scene on the right through the central nexus of the adolescent, contemplating the sailing ship under the protection of a deity. The monumental figures build a space suffocated by their presence, which surrounds and isolates them despite being located outdoors, surrounded by the sea, the geographical environment that shapes the island’s character. On the left, a maternity in the foreground gives way to the rest, under the shade of a dragon tree, of the peasants represented with muscular bodies full of strength, a characteristic also shared by the women of rotund forms, with large and worked feet and hands, carrying the fruits of their harvest. The characters on the right are similarly constituted, and depict the allegory of the sea as a means of work in the woman dismissing the fisherman. The female nudes stand out with full sculptural forms resting on the rocks, in a self-absorbed attitude, out of context. He paints the people but immersed in a contemplative and immobile world, passive before his design.

Date of receipt: Only in March 1943 did the Casino have the sketch in its possession, despite the fact that a photograph of it was included in the signing of the contract, dated December 1933.

Remarks: When it was time to transfer it to the final canvas, the artist modified the scene on the left, undressing the child frolicking in the mother’s arms, eliminating the protective gesture between the two women on the right and replacing the farmer with the hoe with the one proudly carrying the bunch of bananas. The woman with both feet corresponding to the left side in the scene on the right is striking. The work was loaned for the exhibition Ventana al Arte, organized by the Cabildo Insular de Tenerife and curated by Luis Ortega Abraham, which was held at the Auditorio de Tenerife from 15-3-2007 to 13-4-2007. For insurance purposes the work was valued at 6,000 euros.

About the author: José Aguiar García (Vueltas de Santa Clara, Cuba,1895- Madrid, 1976), born in Cuba into a family of emigrants, soon returned to La Gomera where he was baptized in the parish of San Marcos de Agulo. He went to Madrid in 1914 to study Law, but abandoned his studies to study Fine Arts at the School of Fine Arts of San Fernando as a disciple of José Pinazo Martínez (1879 – 1938), continuing his training in Florence with a scholarship from the Cabildo Insular de La Gomera. In contact with Renaissance art (especially Masaccio and Michelangelo), he discovers the beauty of the nude and the encaustic technique that he will use for the first time in the Friso Isleño del Casino de Tenerife and will use from then on in his large murals. Since 1920, he has been participating in the National Exhibitions, obtaining a third medal in 1926 for Figures of the gold medal in 1929 for the Women of the Souththe medal of honor for Estío in 1944 and the gold medal of the Círculo de Bellas Artes de Madrid in 1934 with Nude seated. In 1959 he was named member of the Hispanic Society of America and in 1960 of the Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando.

Bibliography:

Archive of the Casino de Tenerife: Correspondence between Ricardo Melchior Navarro, president of the Island Council of Tenerife and Domingo Febles Padrón, then president of the Casino de Tenerife regarding the loan of the sketch of the Friso Isleño for the exhibition Ventana Al Arte.

Carmen Nieves CRESPO DE LAS CASAS: José Aguiar, his life and work. Aula de Cultura del Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1975.

Ángeles ABAD: José Aguiar. Vice-Ministry of Culture and Sports of the Government of the Canary Islands. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1991.

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.

]]> https://rctfe.com/en/sketch-of-the-island-frieze-jose-aguiar/feed/ 0 Portrait of don Faustino Martín Albertos – José Aguiar García https://rctfe.com/en/portrait-of-don-faustino-martin-albertos-jose-aguiar-garcia/ https://rctfe.com/en/portrait-of-don-faustino-martin-albertos-jose-aguiar-garcia/#respond Tue, 10 Aug 2021 10:05:33 +0000 https://rctfe.com/portrait-of-don-faustino-martin-albertos-jose-aguiar-garcia/


  1. Type of work: Easel painting
  2. Technique: Oil on canvas
  3. Approximate dimensions: 95 x 78 cm
  4. Subject: Portrait
  5. Title: Portrait of Mr. Faustino Martín Albertos
  6. Author: José Aguiar García (1895-1976)
  7. Chronology or Year: (1930-1940)
  8. Historical-artistic analysis:

Style: Portrait painting, within the academic tradition, with fidelity to reality used as an expression of the personality and psychology of the person represented.

Description: It is a seated portrait inside a room where a red armchair, slightly oriented to the right, welcomes the character represented who turns his face towards the viewer in an attitude of observation, reserve and a certain defiance. Located in the foreground, the background of the room is occupied by a garden landscape with lush vegetation, seen through an open window or simply forming part of a painting that adorns the wall, thus creating the effect of the painting within the painting. This resource, together with the armchair and the elegant posture of the personage sheathed in dark clothing, can be considered identifying elements of the social rank of the person represented, whose physiognomy, faithfully recreated, acts in turn as a vehicle of expression of his emotional state, thus achieving the psychological capture of the character enveloped in an atmosphere of a certain melancholy. The chromatic contrasts of the painting stand out, where color, used boldly, luminous and vibrant, builds the forms, giving them solidity and plasticity.

Date of reception: The canvas was incorporated into the Casino collection in 2000, donated by Mrs. Argelia Martín Santaella through the mediation of the then Secretary of the Society, Mr. Antonio Salgado Pérez.

Remarks: The painting was found by chance by Mr. Antonio Salgado Pérez, then Secretary of this Institution, when he visited Mrs. Argelia Martín Santaella, distant relative of Mr. Faustino Martín Albertos, in order to obtain information about the above mentioned personage in order to found the Prize that was going to bear his name by initiative of the Board of Directors of the Casino. At the end of the interview, Mrs. Martín Santaella expressed her willingness to donate to the Casino a portrait of Don Faustino that she kept in her home, since that would have been the wish of the man who had been president of the institution from 1928 to December 1936. The person represented, a lawyer by profession, was linked to this institution for many years, not only as president from December 1928 to December 1936. In the General Meeting of 20 – 11 – 1916 he began his participation in the board of directors of the society as Librarian, and then became Secretary in 1919, Member in 1923 and Secretary again in 1924 and 1925. He was a close friend of the painter José Aguiar, whom he commissioned the Friso Isleño during his presidential term. The portrait was probably made during those years of his mandate, and in it we can perceive his friendship in the approach and understanding of the portrayed, to whom he was also united by their common relationship with Freemasonry. In this sense, it should be remembered that Miguel Martín Fernández de la Torre, his brother Néstor and the sculptor Francisco Borges were also Masons. All of them contributed, together with Aguiar, to the construction and decoration of the new Casino building, under the presidency of Don Faustino Martín.

About the author: José Aguiar García (Vueltas de Santa Clara, Cuba,1895- Madrid, 1976), born in Cuba into a family of emigrants, soon returned to La Gomera where he was baptized in the parish of San Marcos de Agulo. He went to Madrid in 1914 to study Law, but abandoned his studies to study Fine Arts at the School of Fine Arts of San Fernando as a disciple of José Pinazo Martínez (1879 – 1938), continuing his training in Florence with a scholarship from the Cabildo Insular de La Gomera. In contact with Renaissance art (especially Masaccio and Michelangelo), he discovers the beauty of the nude and the encaustic technique that he will use for the first time in the Friso Isleño del Casino de Tenerife and will use from then on in his large murals. Since 1920, he has been participating in the National Exhibitions, obtaining a third medal in 1926 for Figures of the gold medal in 1929 for the Women of the Souththe medal of honor for Estío in 1944 and the gold medal of the Círculo de Bellas Artes of Madrid in 1934 with Nude seated. In 1959 he was named member of the Hispanic Society of America and in 1960 of the Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando.

Bibliography:

Casino de Tenerife Archive: Minutes of the Board of Directors’ Meeting of March 30, 2000

Carmen Nieves CRESPO DE LAS CASAS: José Aguiar, his life and work. Aula de Cultura del Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1975.

Ángeles ABAD: José Aguiar. Viceconsejería de Cultura y Deportes del Gobierno de Canarias, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 1991.

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.

Antonio SALGADO PÉREZ: “Una pequeña historia del lienzo-retrato de don Faustino Martín Albertos, obra de don José Aguiar”, in the magazine Casino de Tenerife, no 8. Santa Cruz de Tenerife, April 2001, pp. 22 y 23.

David MARTÍN LÓPEZ: Confidences of an architect: Miguel Martín Fernández de la Torre. Conference given at the Casino of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, on December 3, 2008.

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