Isidre Nonell
Nonell's oeuvre has such a coherent unity that any one of his works is amply representative of his artistic production. Distinctly expressionistic, full of contained drama and crushing sordidness, his painting offended the conventional tastes of the Barcelona bourgeoisie. And yet the artist did not give in, and with great formal simplicity his oeuvre conveys the poverty, the most absolute solitude and introversion of the figures he depicts. Gypsy women, living testimonies albeit far removed from the painter's everyday reality, enabled him to avoid inconsequential anecdote and confront the intangible representation of his characters' inner worlds. After the success of his solo exhibition in 1910 he turned to the still life, a genre he explored until his premature death the following year. Moreover, this section comprises two remarkable paintings by Gutiérrez Solana, clear exponents of the artist's critical and expressive-absolutely Goyesque-approach to the most sordid side of Spanish reality of the period.
