The Sorolla Museum presents Sorolla femenino plural, an exhibition offering a new reading of the female figure in the work of the Valencia-born painter, a subject matter foremost in many of his canvases. After Madrid, the exhibition will travel to Valencia.

With his signature brushwork and avant-garde outlook, the artist immortalised women from different social classes, portraying them with sensitivity and respect, highlighting such important values as fortitude and courage. Instead of the artist’s celebrated summer scenes that reflect the bright Mediterranean light, this exhibition centres on a more intimate and endearing side to Sorolla, deeply devoted to the image of women.

Sorolla femenino plural, which remains on view through 10 January 2021, explores various images the painter made of women from his time. Throughout his career Sorolla often represented women as mythical characters, aristocratic ladies, working women, mothers, or other archetypes. All these varied depictions are featured in this exhibition which includes loans from public and private collections. At once, it also provides an insight into customs and manners in Spain in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century.

The BBVA Collection is contributing to the exhibition with Messalina in the Arms of a Gladiator, a painting dated from 1886, during Sorolla’s scholarship in Rome. Set in the period of Emperor Claudius (1st century AD, before year 48), it represents his wife Messalina in the arms of a gladiator. Occupying the centre of the composition, she is reclining seductively against the gladiator, offering him a garland of flowers to celebrate his victory in combat. The details of the background reflect the period in question, like the frieze inspired by Pompeian paintings, and the ceramic vessels resting on the architecture that frames the protagonists. Here, Sorolla uses a classical subject matter to show the image of a refined, sensuous but also assertive woman.