EDUARDO ROSALES GALLINAS (Madrid, 1836 - 1873)._x000D_ "The Shepherd, 1870._x000D_ Oil on canvas._x000D_ It has slight restorations._x000D_ It has exhibition labels on the back and a label of the Rosales Testamentary signed by Gabriel Maureta._x000D_ Dutch style frame with damage._x000D_ Signed, dated and located in the lower right corner._x000D_ Measurements: 70,5 x 63,5 cm; 93,5 x 86 cm (frame)._x000D_ Work exhibited in:_x000D_ - Pintores de la luz, art gallery of the Banco de Bilbao (Castellana, 81), Madrid 10 October-10 November 1983._x000D_ - Four generations of Madrid painters: Rosales and his descendants, Sala Picaso, Madrid, 1 February-31 March 1984._x000D_ - Eduardo Rosales in private collections, Ibercaja, Centro de Exposiciones y Congresos, Zaragoza 3 October-31 December 2000._x000D_ _x000D_ Work reproduced in:_x000D_ -Los genios de la pintura española, Eduardo Rosales, Ed. Sarpe, 1988, p. 24._x000D_ - Catalogue of the exhibition Eduardo Rosales in private collections, Ibercaja, Centro de Exposiciones y Congresos, Zaragoza 3 October-31 December 2000, p. 151, cat.33._x000D_ Eduardo Rosales spent a large part of his artistic career in Rome, where he laid the foundations of his academicist aesthetic. In fact, in 1973 he was proposed as director of the Spanish Academy in Rome, but due to his death he was unable to take up the post. In this work set in Rome, the author presents us with an idyllic character who conveys a bucolic image of his profession as a shepherd. Oblivious to the viewer's gaze, he stands in the centre of the composition, his face turned to the right and holding a flute in his hands. The whole scene is dominated by a broad, sketchy brushstroke which is at its best in the conception of the landscape._x000D_ Born into a humble family, Eduardo Rosales was trained in the Nazarenism that then dominated the Madrid Academy of Fine Arts, where he entered in 1851 and was a pupil of Federico de Madrazo. Thanks to friends and colleagues, including the painters Palmaroli and Álvarez Catalá, Rosales travelled to Italy by his own means in 1857 in their company. During the trip he visited Bordeaux and Nîmes, where he was impressed by the historical paintings of Léon Cogniet and Paul Delaroche. In Rome he survived with difficulty until he finally obtained a government pension in 1860, which enabled him to produce his first important works. After his first great triumph at the National Exhibition of Fine Arts in 1864, he remained for some time in Madrid, where he painted several portraits, both family and commissioned. In 1865 he travelled to Paris with Martín Rico and Raimundo de Madrazo, and returned there two years later. However, these years of his life were spent mainly in Rome, where he worked intensely before returning to Spain in 1868 following his marriage. During this period he received important aristocratic, religious and governmental commissions, although he was also interested in types and landscapes during his stays in Panticosa and Murcia. Towards the end of his life, after a controversial success at the National Exhibition of 1871, he was proposed as the first director of the newly founded Spanish Academy in Rome in 1873, a post he did not take up as he died. A leading figure in 19th-century Spanish painting, his early works reveal a personal style that tends towards a historicist monumentality, but at the same time synthetic, still with cold ranges, in the orbit of Romantic purism. His mature style is forged through a personal interpretation of the pictorial myths of his time, within an international academicism, although dominated by Velázquez, until he reached a completely modern plastic autonomy. Although he worked in portraiture, religious painting, painting of popular types, etc., his artistic career was strongly determined by his success in official exhibitions.