This superb sketch is a portrait of the Catalan actor Enrique Borrás (1863—1957), one of the great thespians in fin-de-siècle Spain.
 
In an article published in the ABC daily newspaper in 1966, Vázquez Díaz praised his model highly, defining him as “the greatest and most personal figure in the performing arts in Spain, thanks to his naturalness, his skill on stage, the expression of his visage, and the powerful modulation of his voice, always in harmony with the feeling of the character he plays, overpowering the audience and turning fiction into reality.”
 
Vázquez Díaz was speaking more specifically of the actor’s lead role in El Místico, a play written by the multifaceted artist Santiago Rusiñol (1861—1931). Indeed, as the article clarifies, the artist met Rusiñol around 1904 in Borrás’ dressing room after one of the actor’s masterful performances at Teatro de la Comedia in Madrid.
 
Vázquez Díaz most likely sketched this pencil portrait of Borrás while acting on stage, for his quick, unerring lines and heightened realism captures the sheer quality of the actor’s performance. In point of fact, in the article he wrote: “Borrás was performing in El Místico, and one of those evenings I tried to catch his expression live amid frenzied ovations for the two great Catalan artists,” also referring to Rusiñol, for whom he felt deep admiration.