'Americans in Spain: Painting and Travel, 1820-1920' Review: Iberian Influence
An exhibition highlights how sites like the Alhambra and old masters like Velázquez inspired a century of U.S. painters.

Norfolk, Va.

Like the U.S. itself, American art is woven from many strands, with the biggest and brightest threads inspired by French, British and Italian traditions. A new exhibition at the Chrysler Museum of Art gives weight and luster to a different aesthetic influence: "Americans in Spain: Painting and Travel, 1820-1920" explores the many ways American artists like William Merritt Chase, Mary Cassatt, Thomas Eakins and John Singer Sargent learned from the art, architecture, landscapes and people of Spain.

Cassatt's "Spanish Girl..."

A disarming piece of evidence appears at the show's entrance, where a charming portrait by Chase from 1899 shows his young daughter dressed and posed like the infanta in Diego Velázquez's masterpiece "Las Meninas" (1656). Her name is Helen Velázquez Chase.

Americans first learned of Spain's seductive culture from books, prints and paintings (many by British artists, who got there early in the 19th century), and that's where visitors to this exhibition also start. The sampling here includes Washington Irving's popular "Tales of the Alhambra" (1832), a collection of essays about "one of the most remarkable, romantic, and delicious spots in the world"—which is still in print. Irving is also memorialized in a painting by David Wilkie —"Washington Irving in the Archives of Seville" (1828-29)—as a handsome, curly haired scholar poring over a thick volume.

Henri's "Matador"

By the end of the Civil War, American artists began traveling to Spain in droves. Once there, many went first to the Prado Museum, where they copied the Old Masters. Bartolomé Esteban Murillo's celestial "The Immaculate Conception of El Escorial" (1660-65) illustrates the riches they saw. Jusepe de Ribera and El Greco, both represented in the exhibit, and Francisco de Zurbarán and Francisco de Goya, present in paintings by their workshops, also merited copying.

But the real lure was Velázquez. His full-length "Queen Mariana of Austria" (1652-53), which remains in Madrid, was the model for Robert Henri's "Queen Mariana" (1900). It doesn't match the sure lines and pouty character of the master's version. Nor do "Copy of a Fragment of a Portrait of Queen Mariana of Austria after Velázquez" (1883) by Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida or "Queen Mariana"
(c. 1652–53) by Juan Bautista Martínez del Mazo, a son-in-law of Velázquez. But exactitude isn't the point: Artists learn by trying to achieve the effects of a master, experimenting with composition, color, light and brushstrokes, and museum-goers train their eye by comparing them.

Chase's "Carmencita"

From here, the exhibition branches out, just as the artists did. Exposed first-hand to Islamic culture, they painted its architecture and envisioned its people. Captivated by bullfighters, dancers and peasants, they portrayed them sympathetically. Seemingly delighted by what they construed as colorful labor customs, they depicted workers happily washing clothes in a river and toiling in factories. Stunned by the beauty of Spain's craggy mountains, lush gardens and ancient landmarks, they painted them—especially the Alhambra in Granada. Finally, eager to satisfy the quest for knowledge back home, they photographed tourist destinations.

"Americans in Spain," curated by Corey Piper, of the Chrysler, and Brandon Ruud, of the Milwaukee Museum of Art (where the show will open June 11), devotes a gallery to each of those themes, and in bringing these artworks together—some of which are well-known—visitors gain new context and greater appreciation for them.

For example, you will see three paintings that Cassatt made in Spain. Her glorious "Offering the Panal to the Bullfighter" (1873) and "After the Bullfight" (1873) flank "Spanish Girl Leaning on a Window Sill" (c. 1872). Each one is rich in design and color, beautifully painted. Moreover, they represent a breakthrough moment for Cassatt, as stated in the wall labels. Having studied Velázquez, Murillo and Goya, Cassatt devised her own modernist style, fusing realism with vigorous brushwork (seen especially in the matador's costume) and attention to character.

You also see two full-length portraits of the Spanish dancer Carmencita, both from 1890, a face-off between Sargent and Chase. Chase's picture shows her dressed in black and gold, arms raised and feet in action, smiling, perhaps in recognition of the flowers at her feet. Sargent's unsmiling version highlights her haughtiness. Dressed in brilliant yellow, arms akimbo, she looks down at viewers, and though her pose is static, Sargent's showy brushwork makes her seem more alive than she is in Chase's more conventional portrait.

Cassatt's "Offering the Panal..."

You see three full-length portraits created by Henri in 1906. Here he succeeds in conveying the different characters of his three subjects: a somber bullfighter, formally posed as if contemplating danger, in "El Matador ( Felix Asiego )"; a comical, slouchy "Gypsy With a Guitar (Gitano)" in midsong; and his sympathetic, wary wife and daughter, "María y Consuelo." Henri's marks in the last two paintings are brushy; he used more control for the fine details of the matador.

You see other comparisons, too: views of Segovia, one by Ernest Lawson (c. 1916), and the other, looser, by Carrie Hill (c. 1925); and of the Alhambra by John Ferguson Weir (c. 1901) and by Mary Bradish Titcomb (c. 1906), to name two examples.

After Henri initially visited the Prado in 1900, he wrote home: "If I had only known I would have come here long ago." The same may be said of the theme of this exhibit.