A floral offering and cello music before the tomb where the remains of Joaquín Sorolla rest in the General Cemetery of Valencia have accompanied the tribute made this Thursday to the considered most universal Valencian artist on the day that marks the centenary of his death.
During this tribute, organized by the Sorolla Museum and the Sorolla Museum Foundation and which has been brief due to the high temperatures registered today in the city, the great-grandson of the painter Antonio Mollà Lorente and his great-great-granddaughter Ana Richi Pons-Sorolla have deposited a set floral pattern made up of roses, astromelias and hydrangeas in which blue, yellow, white and greenish colors predominated, those that Sorolla captured on his canvases.
Subsequently, the cellist Félix Romero has interpreted the Cant dels Ocells, and Antonio Mollá, who chairs the Permanent Commission of the Sorolla Museum Foundation, stressed that today was an “important day” to pay tribute to “a formidable painter” and one of ” the most illustrious sons” of this city.
Sorolla’s remains were moved to Valencia a few days after he died in Cercedilla (Madrid) on August 10, 1923, three years after suffering an attack of hemiplegia, and although he was initially buried in a pantheon owned by Antonio García, his political family, later his grandson and architect Francisco Pons Sorolla built his own mausoleum in the same General Cemetery of Valencia.
The remains of Joaquín Sorolla and his wife, Clotilde García, and their three children, rest in his tomb, with simple lines and containing the city’s coat of arms and a laurel wreath in the center of which is the word “SOROLLA”. as well as other members of the family, as explained to journalists by the painter’s great-grandson, Antonio Mollá.
As Mollá has indicated, the coffin with Sorolla’s remains arrived by train from Madrid to Valencia, and from the city’s North Station to the General Cemetery the transfer was made in an artillery chest because he received the honors of captain general, in which was an event that filled the streets of the Valencian capital with people.
“Today is a very important day, the key day of the year for what it means”, Antonio Mollá pointed out, indicating that with his death Valencia lost “one of its most illustrious citizens” and his family “a very dear person and fundamental. His passion was painting and his other passion was family”.
In addition to relatives of the painter, the event was attended by the Councilor for Cultural Action, Heritage and Cultural Resources of the Valencia City Council, José Luis Moreno, who highlighted the “pride” felt by the city for having “one of the most important painters in history”, the acting mayoress of Valencia, Julia Climent, or the president of the Bancaja Foundation, Rafael Alcón.
Previously, and within a program of activities to pay tribute to the painter, Sorolla has also been the subject of a tribute in the gardens of the artist’s house-museum in Madrid.
This tribute consisted of the placement in the museum garden, under the bust sculpted by the renowned artist and friend of the painter Mariano Benlliurre, of a floral set in which two bands commemorated the year of his birth and the year of his death (1923 -2023), after which the cellist Javier Morillas has interpreted “El cisne”, by Saint Saens.
In addition to this tribute, today admission to the Sorolla Museum will be free, there will be micro-concerts and there will be guided tours of the temporary exhibitions. ONCE is also launching today a commemorative coupon illustrated with the work “The Arrival of the Boats” and the tickets of the National Lottery on the 12th will have the painting “La bata rosa” printed on it.
