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Sad Inheritance!
Joaquín Sorolla · Realism & Academic
- Artist
- Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida (1863–1923)
- Date
- 1899
- Dimensions
- 210 x 285 cm
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Location
- Fundación Bancaja, Valencia, Spain
Sad Inheritance! shows a group of disabled boys, children of a charity hospital in Valencia, bathing in the sea under the watchful eye of a monk. It won the Grand Prix at the Paris World's Fair of 1900.
A closer look
The bright Mediterranean light that Sorolla usually used for joyful beach scenes here falls on thin, pale bodies: boys with crutches, a child on the shoulders of another, a boy with a withered leg being helped into the water. The black-robed friar stands in the waves like a protective shadow. The title refers to the belief at the time that the children's polio and other illnesses were the 'inheritance' of their parents' diseases. The painting combines Sorolla's brilliant technique with deep compassion and social concern.
