THE EVER REMARKABLE SOLANA
María José Salazar
It is not easy to analyse an artist´s profile as a draughtsman, taking his drawing as separate from the rest of his production, especially when this area of his work has historically been little studied, little valued and, in short, little known.
In my view, drawing, generally regarded simply as a vehicle from which to create what are considered to be “greater” works, reflects better than any other form of expression the mark, personality, demeanour and the most novel version of an artist´s method, whether it is a sketch or a final work.
This is even more complex in the case of an artist like Solana, with a strong personality, a great painter, magnificent etcher and excellent writer, unquestionably on a par with the great persons of letters of his time.
Solana is a solitary artist who reproduces the same themes present in the works of his contemporaries: bullfights, dances, processions, brothels and popular fiestas, and he does so from a personal perspective, exploring characters with considerable social content: emigrants, indianos (Spanish emigrants who returned from America), bullfighters, prostitutes, always in a truthful manner, conveying the only vision of Spain he recognises, that of the society of that time.
Solana´s literary experience runs parallel to his artistic experience. The writer Solana is in his drawings, and the artist Solana in his written works, with a common denominator: black, the lead colour of his palette, of his writing, and possibly of his mood.
En sus escritos, transcribe las anotaciones que fielmente recoge en los viajes que realiza a través del territorio español, páginas que, en definitiva, son meros dibujos de la realidad que observa, a la que no enjuicia ni valora.
In his writings, he transcribes notes that he takes faithfully during journeys around Spain; sheets of notebooks that, ultimately, are mere sketches of the reality he sees, which he neither judges nor appraises.
Camilo José Cela always considered that Solana was as good a painter as he was a writer, and his inaugural address to Spain´s Real Academia de la Lengua, in 1957, focused on The Literary Works of the Painter Solana, his complete written works later to be published by Alfaguara.
The same commitment to rescuing and valuing Solana´s literary work is undertaken today by the writer Andrés Trapiello, who, through La Veleta publishing, has published a series of hitherto unseen works by the artist: España negra I, España negra II, and Cuadernos de París. The latter includes notes taken during his years of exile, when he lived in Colegio de España, in Paris´s Cité Internationale.
For the author, “Solana´s books are the perfect corollary to his paintings”, and their interest lies essentially in the fact that “Solana wrote for the same reason he painted, and he painted the same way he wrote, painting neither better nor worse than he wrote, and writing neither better nor worse than he painted1”.
With an unmistakable personality, Solana developed his career at the height of the Spanish avant-garde movements, in which he participated to an extent, paradoxically receiving the consideration and recognition of the artists belonging to these movements, for whom Solana was, nevertheless, an isolated, singular, unclassifiable figure due to his profound relationship with Spanish painting tradition.
With a singular, indeed extraordinary, personality, he is a truly exceptional and unique artist within the context in which he worked and, more broadly, in the history of Spain. This, which might seem obvious, is the key to understanding his importance in 20th-century Spanish painting.
In terms of period, he belonged to the Generation of ´98, but he did not have the critical approach that pervaded that group´s work. Moreover, despite coexisting with the avant-garde, his work presents no formal renewal, his figurative style is far removed from the Spanish painting tradition because of its naturalism, bordering on realism, and although neither is it clearly expressionist, he is often compared with the creators of this European artistic movement.
Perhaps for these reasons his art (both painting and drawing) met with contradictory reactions and not a little controversy. While for some he was a mirror of his time, for others his work is far removed from the society he lived in. But perhaps it is precisely this dichotomy that makes his work so attractive and original, leaving no-one indifferent.
The vast majority of scholars of his work agree only on one common thread: Spanish painting tradition. Gerardo Diego sees in his work the influence of the anonymous Castilian artists; Jorge Larco, of Goya and Brueghel; Charenol links him with Morales, El Greco and Valdés Leal; Gómez de la Serna, with El Greco. Marta Davisson links his work with Velázquez and Goya, and Bernardino de Pantorba even sees the influence of Rembrandt, while Luis Alonso notices Brueghel´s ascendency.
There is unanimous agreement that Solana´s work was influenced by the classics, and in particular by the Spanish classics, and this can clearly be traced to his training, as the artist himself asserts. For him, the Spanish School was the best in the world. In his only public declaration he said that “El Greco, Velázquez and Goya are for me the first unavoidable Capitoline Triad. In Velázquez, his wisdom forms the basis of all Spanish painting. In El Greco, the psychology of an era is emotionally translated [...], in Goya are all our virtues and all our sins, our characteristic "improvisations" and our great failures. He is the polemicist of painting2”.
In effect, Solana was fascinated by Goya, but his work shows a different intentionality to that of the master. Solana draws what he sees, as an eye witness, never judging, never offering his opinion, unlike Goya. Solana studies, looks, and conveys. Goya studies, judges, and conveys, critically. Their approach and understanding of the society in which they live couldn´t be more different. What is especially interesting to Solana about Goya are his themes, his manner of expression, even his palette.
In effect, Solana was fascinated by Goya, but his work shows a different intentionality to that of the master. Solana draws what he sees, as an eye witness, never judging, never offering his opinion, unlike Goya. Solana studies, looks, and conveys. Goya studies, judges, and conveys, critically. Their approach and understanding of the society in which they live couldn´t be more different. What is especially interesting to Solana about Goya are his themes, his manner of expression, even his palette.
Of Velázquez he profoundly admires his technique: “He is the best painter in the first era”, his realism, his disquieting verism, which, translated into his own language, he himself aims at achieving in his works. Formal and technical resonances can be traced in his works that Solana himself interprets in his own way: “His works are technical mandates3”.
And we can consider El Greco, on a different plane, to be his third point of reference: “He shows cerebrally how what is physical may be a mere pretext to express what is intangible in any pictorial sentiment”. This is an interesting comment from a painter so often presented as a banal and simple character4.
The fact is that, with regard to Solana´s personality, there are too many opinions and studies that add little to the analysis of his work. He was clearly atypical both as a person and as an artist. His silences and his responses, the wealth of anecdotes dotting his life, offer the image of a wholly unconventional person.
Attempts have been made to root this surprising individuality in his family environment, in which they were various people with deteriorated mental faculties, including his mother and his brother Luis. These stories and the tragic events of his childhood no doubt left their mark on his character. His own, closed family, where he received the constant protection of his father and then his brother Manuel, must also have influenced his personality.
Sánchez Camargo, in the prologue of his biography, attempts to clarify this question: “Solana is not a monster whose stories – half of which are untrue – serve to enable his enemies, painters and spectators, to attack him; he is more important than that: a spirit with a thirst for perfection whose chosen path will appeal to some more than others, but who is always a person of integrity, truthful, equal and noble5”.
It is true that there are highly unusual aspects to his life: living with a disturbed mother, confined to a room in the depths of the house; his own house, brim-full of Isabelline furniture and with the most extraordinary variety of objects, acquired in Madrid´s Rastro flea market or inherited from his father: sea shells, minerals, old books, pictures of saints, clocks, music boxes and other singular objects, such as the mirror of death or the automaton doll, dressed as a ballerina, moving around the house.
After a visit to Solana´s house in 1934, Alfredo Velarde gave the following description: “glass cabinets, dust, books; a dislocated and romantic ambience”. And he added: “The house is full of dialogues, singing and the quarrels of the children6”.
This unusual atmosphere influences his personal view of everything he sees and transfers to his written work and his art. His is a partial vision of a section of Spanish society, the part that interests him. His peculiar world, which has been called “Solanesque”, reflects only a part of the real Spain, but not the plural Spain of his time.
Lastly, we cannot overlook the influence on his work of his numerous journeys to the most remote villages of Spain, where he always went alone, in third-class train carriages, carrying a bundle of food and staying in simple inns or guest houses.
At this point it is worth specifically analysing in detail Solana´s facet as a draughtsman, a significant legacy of works on paper whose features we will outline.
All of his drawings were devised as definitive creations, not as mere preparatory works or sketches, although some of them did become the basis or inspiration for paintings or etchings.
We can define two common characteristics, the equality of treatment of objects and persons and the preference for the same costumbrista ambiances and marginal classes of society, which he represents in different environments.
They are recurring images, so that all his production may be grouped into a series of themes that we shall look at jointly, in overview, in the varied scenarios that he offers, linked by the main characters, marginal society: scenes of Carnival and masks, scenes with women, scenes of a marginal world, bullfighting scenes, religion and death, and, lastly, his facet as a portrait artist, without forgetting the classical scene in which he was trained.
Presented first are those works, hitherto unseen, produced during his years of training alongside either his uncle José Díaz de Palma or, later, his cousin, José Díaz Gutiérrez, which might be approached as the classical scene of his training (refuting the theory that he lacked training) with studies of clothing and copies of the works of the great masters. These are uncertain, impersonal drawings, but with considerable strength and even beauty. A truly isolated and solitary scene.
In contrast, collectiveness, which is presented cohered into thematic scenes, reveals his varied and unusual iconography and allows us to palpably appraise Solana´s exceptional qualities as a draughtsman, especially in his use of and skill in the broken line, with which he strengthens images at the same time as delimiting them, enveloping them and leaving the patent trace of his feelings and thoughts upon the figure.
The group of Carnival scenes and masks is among Solana´s best-known and most celebrated. Judging by the countless times he tackles the Carnival, one might also believe it is the artist´s favourite theme, perhaps because there is a significant biographical element in it. It sometimes appears that Solana wants to wear a mask vis-à-vis the society around him and protect himself from a world that is hostile to him and that does not understand him.
Sometimes he represents individual characters, others he draws several figures in different poses, but always covered by grotesque or ironic masks and with the same attitude, as though posing for a camera. In around 1933, after a trip around southern Spain, he introduces the musical representation offered by the fiestas and all their fanfare.
Solana´s concept of women is revealed by his various scenes in which they are featured. As in his writings, he represents them without appeal, lacking in beauty, ageing. Female figures he saw, and even lived among, in a number of brothels on calle del Arrabal in Santander and calle de Ceres in Madrid, where most of the brothels he frequented were located.
Choir girls, Claudia´s girls, las chulas, the girls from calle del Arrabal, constantly appear in his drawings. Solana feels a strange admiration for them, valuing their stoicism in life, their silence and their selflessness: “How they suffer and how brave they are in the face of things and adversities [...]. They are the most uncomplaining thing in the world7”.
This stereotypical woman, lacking appeal, is common in his iconography, even, paradoxically, when he uses her as a symbol of lust in his works for the painting El fin del mundo (The End of the World). In those drawings in which the woman appears as a hairdresser, as in La peinadora (The Hairdresser), she represents the same graceless figure, lacking youth and beauty, absorbed in her world, resigned to her life, enveloped in an atmosphere of silence and quiet.
The artist, who remained single all his life, had very few love affairs. Life with his disturbed mother and her complex personality undoubtedly led him to have that personal view of women, which has induced criticism and has even led psychiatrists to conduct in-depth research on his personality and to trace a specific psychological profile of the artist.
In the scenes of a marginal world we see lower-class characters who are curiously afforded great dignity. In both his writing and his drawing, he focuses on beggars, poor people, pimps, and the various professions he observes in his travels around the suburbs of Madrid: the districts of Tetuán, Prosperidad or Ventas.
His characters emerge with long-suffering faces, resigned to their fate and serene. He represents them in their own environment, surrounded by all that identifies them in their misery, as though wanting to tweak the consciences of the people who look at them, unaware of their situation, and exercising a variety of professions, with marginality the common denominator.
He prefers to represent the scene rather than the leading characters themselves, whom he draws surrounded by elements that identify their work. He does not focus on the character. Only occasionally, as in the case of the clown or the blind man in the romances, does he draw the figures isolated, dressed in attire that makes them immediately identifiable.
And although sometimes the professions represented are to be found everywhere in the city, he always draws the same sordid and melancholy atmosphere.
In both his drawings and his writings, the bullfighting scenes are somewhat incongruent. No doubt they reflect Solana´s ambivalent view – on the one hand a profound admiration for the symbolism of bullfights and on the other a rejection of the hardness and cruelty.
He is horrified and at once fascinated by bullfighting, a duality that disappears when he represents the figure of the bullfighter, for whom he feels enormous respect due to his constantly confronting death. There is, no doubt, a significant autobiographical component here, since Solana wanted to be a bullfighter, and even tried his hand at bullfighting.
The two sides of bullfighting, which he draws in only a few scenes of tauromachy and all lacking drama, as though he were only interested in the artistic content of the theme, sometimes delighting in the closest environment. We can include the scant landscapes he traced as part of this scene, in which sometimes nature takes on an identity.
We may conclude our overview of the different themes with the religious and death scenes, melancholy and pessimistic, in which he evidences his eccentricity, expressed clearly in the ex libris works, where death is represented by skeletons. Intensity and drama in the two counterpositioned figures.
Solana is especially interested in processions, in which we note his utter lack of religious emotion, feeling attracted only by the more anecdotal and esoteric aspects of religion.
Ordinary people are part of these processions – hard-to-identify figures with rugged faces, devoid of religious sentiment. They look upon the spectacle unmoved, carrying candles that light a scene that is overshadowed by natural light.
These are magnificent drawings of baroque composition, full of diverse characters: they are all cardboard-like figures, absent, populating an iconography that we may consider to be very Solanesque, although admittedly the theme was also touched upon by other artists of his generation.
We shall end this brief overview with the solitary characters that show us his facet as a portrait artist, manifested in some quite memorable drawings: José Cabrero, or Florencio Cornejo, el Mudo. There is always rigidity and even a certain stoicism in their faces, which certainly takes away some of their beauty. In some he uses colour, moving closer to painting, and they are more elaborate, while others are just quick sketches, as in the heads of Gómez de la Serna or Francisco Vega. They are solitary, not idealised, just as he sees them.
In all the drawings, the stroke, powerful and direct and quite thick, enables him to strengthen the image using highly expressive closed forms, which in many cases he exalts with colour, without falling into naturalism. It is the same working method we see in his paintings, when he “draws” with oil paint and a firm and sure stroke, affording them great expressiveness, at the same time as limiting the movement. He always represents his characters as trapped in time, solitary and immobile; he freezes the action in the very act of executing the work.
And although he is skilled with charcoal and graphite, it is perhaps with pastels and water colours, closer to paint, that he achieves his best work, especially using chiaroscuros.
There are great differences in the composition of his drawings. Some comprise swift strokes and isolated figures, while others are complex, even baroque compositions.
As we have said, Solana often returns to the same theme. The similarity of the works creates the confused impression that they are copies or even tracings. In these cases, by studying the originals we can deduce that they are different works, but they are so alike that it is sometimes hard to distinguish one from another.
The duplicate images are sometimes technically different; sometimes drawn with charcoal or graphite, others with pastels or water colours, still others embossed or transferred to canvas. In reality, this produces significant differences in the various versions, but his iconography remains intact. It is a simple work method that Solana´s prodigious memory makes possible.
His creative process begins by tracing figures with graphite, quickly, and he later works them using India ink, often correcting the previous strokes.
Because of their specificity and technique, the work he did when he was in France is worth special mention, most notably the drawings he made alongside his writings, part of which were published in Cuadernos de París. Although they are not standalone drawings, they are part of his creative process, which is the basis of his inspiration.
Everything in Solana seems unmovable. Conceptually, we cannot establish any evolution. His vision of the world, that Solanesque world, is there from his very first works and will last until his death. Nothing alters his vision, either in his period of training or when he reaches maturity, or even at the height of his production and, naturally, in his last works.
For fifty years he altered neither his iconography nor his way of working: control of strokes, broken line, the two-dimensional perspective he uses to present scenes or characters, frontally to the viewers, and formal construction with very balanced planes. Neither is his treatment of light, shadows played against light, altered over the years, perhaps because, although Solana took notes and made sketches outdoors, he drew inside his house, with artificial light, which affords his work a dark mood.
We might also say of his aesthetic that it does not change over time and that it revolves around a certain naturalism, close to realism. Perhaps this immobilism is the key to his unalterable personality.
The fact that there is much more literature on Solana´s painting, his writing or even his personality from a medical or psychological standpoint does not detract from his drawing; especially when, for the artist himself, it was as valuable as the painting, as evidenced by the fact that he presented it at important exhibitions.
We are left with the image of an atypical personality, a surprisingly original and exceptional draughtsman, who sketches on the loose note paper he always carries in his pockets and who uses “a pencil he sucks before drawing8”.
- 1- Andrés Trapiello, La luz sin problemas (Solana escritor), in José Gutiérrez Solana
(exhibition cat. Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia), Madrid, Turner, 2004, page 226. - 2- Manuel Sánchez Camargo, Solana Vida y Pintura, Madrid, Taurus, 1962, page 276 (comments by José Gutiérrez Solana on Spanish National Radio).
- 3- Ibidem, page 275 (comments by José Gutiérrez Solana on Spanish National Radio).
- 4- Ibidem, page 275 (comments by José Gutiérrez Solana on Spanish National Radio).
- 5- Manuel Sánchez Camargo, Solana. Vida y pintura, cit., page 13.
- 6- Alfredo Velarde, Vida y estampas de José Gutiérrez Solana, conferencia pronunciada en el Ateneo de Santander, el 25 de agosto de 1934 (Diario, 26 de agosto de 1934,pag.14)
- 7- Manuel Sánchez Camargo, Solana. Vida y pintura, cit., pág. 267.
- 8- Manuel Sánchez Camargo, Solana. Vida y pintura, cit., pág. 114
María José Salazar