The goal of Proust and the Arts, the exhibition at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, is to analyse the role played by the visual arts in the output of Marcel Proust (1871-1922), one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century and author of celebrated works of literature, philosophy and art theory.

For a proper insight into Proust, one needs to understand the setting in which he lived and worked in Paris, the quintessential cosmopolitan city of the turn of the century. In addition, one should also bear in mind that his fascination with the arts at a moment when the image of modernity was being shaped by experimental painters was absolutely key in laying the foundations for the Proustian aesthetic.

Within this fin-de-siècle artistic and literary setting, it is worth highlighting the figure of Federico Carlos de Madrazo (1875-1935), better known as Cocó Madrazo. Belonging to the fourth generation of a family of artists, Cocó’s exceptional talent and sensibility won him a place in Parisian high society. He struck up friendships with many notable figures, including Proust, and made a name for himself primarily as a portraitist. A good example of his work is this Portrait of Arthur Chaplin (1904), the oil-on-canvas painting with which the BBVA Collection is collaborating in the exhibition, a wonderful opportunity to showcase part of the limited output of a painter who died at the early age of thirty-five, a fact explaining why his work is not as extensive or famous as that of his predecessors.