This work, a superb interior scene by the Catalan artist, depicts his wife Julia Peraire in one of the rooms of the Maricel complex.

Ramón Casas met Julia in 1906. He was 40 years old at the time, whereas she was 18. The image of this humble lottery seller stuck in the artist’s mind, and she was to be the subject of many portraits. Through them we can follow their relationship, their marriage in 1922 and the stability it gave him. Julia was featured regularly in the spaces Casas depicted in his canvases.

This interior scene shows Julia in her maturity, portrayed in the privacy of her room. Casas, who excelled in capturing atmospheres, conveys a feeling of serenity, peace and tranquillity. The intense yellow he portrayed her in the early years of their relationship (for instance, in the painting La Sargantain) is seen again here on the walls, though aged by the passing of the years.

This canvas was probably shown in 1924 at Sala Parés alongside another two interior scenes. Around this time the artist worked a lot with this subject matter as it allowed him to experiment with both perspective and colour. Its refined description of furniture and fabrics and bright colouring provides a special uniqueness to this piece, whose photography-like framing recalls his early works painted in Paris and Barcelona.

In this particular case, the scene is placed in one of the buildings of the Maricel complex in Sitges, a significant personal project by the American industrialist, collector and philanthropist Charles Deering, a close friend of Casas. Conceived as a residence as well as a place to house his comprehensive art collections, the name was inspired by the title of a work by the author Ángel Guimerà, Mar i cel (Catalan for sea and sky) and alludes to its privileged location.

Deering entrusted the refurbishment of the main building (a former hospital) as well as the enlargement of his collections, to the artist and engineer Miquel Utrillo (1862-1934).

In 1921, a number of disagreements with Utrillo led Deering to leave Maricel and return to the United States, taking his collection with him. For a symbolic price he sold Casas his winter residence, where the latter would occasionally sojourn.

Julia en Maricel  was shown in the exhibition Julia, el Desig, held at Cercle del Liceu, Barcelona, in 2016, the year commemorating the 150^th anniversary of Casas’s birth.