Heliodoro Guillén

HELIODORO GUILLÉN PEDEMONTI (Alicante, 1864 - Alicante, 1940).
"Valenciana".
Oil on canvas.
Presents flaws in the canvas and patches on the back.
Signed, dated and dedicated in the lower right corner.
Measurements: 63 x 48 cm; 73 x 57 cm (frame).
This type of work was very common, and appreciated, in Spanish art from the nineteenth century until well into the twentieth century. Where the creation of popular patterns portrayed through an idyllic vision where the author is influenced by an aesthetic and romantic heritage, developed during the second half of the nineteenth century and which resulted in a localist conception of the landscape, in works that reflected the love for the land itself and the beauty and lyricism of the everyday, what is close, what is known.
Heliodoro Guillén studied at the San Fernando School of Fine Arts in Madrid, where he was a disciple of Casto Plasencia and Lorenzo Casanova. He specialized in landscape painting, showing a clear preference for seascapes, although his portraits and compositions with figures are also noteworthy. A friend of Joaquín Sorolla, he took part in various exhibitions held in Spanish cities, and was awarded three times at the National Exhibition of Fine Arts: with a third medal in 1892 and 1895, and with a decoration in 1899. He was also awarded a silver medal at the Alicante Exhibition in 1894.