1122 - Felipe Moratilla Parreto (Madrid 1827-1908-9)

Felipe Moratilla Parreto (Madrid 1827-1908-9) Marquesa de Martinez-Campos Carved marble bust. Signed "F. Moratilla" It depicts an elderly lady wearing a mantilla fastened with a rose and a medallion around her neck, with the profile of a gentleman with a goatee. It stands on a pedestal with large relief initials MC surmounted by a ducal crown and ivy branches embracing the pedestal. It appears to be an allegory of the lady's widowhood: the mantilla is a sign of mourning, the medallion around her neck possibly represents her deceased husband, the rose symbolizes love, and the ivy embodies fidelity, eternity, and an indissoluble bond. The identity of the woman depicted is unknown, despite clues suggesting she was a widow with the initials MC and the title of duchess. It could be hypothesized that this is a sculpture of Queen Maria Cristina of Bourbon after she was widowed in 1873 from her second husband. While the sculpture bears no resemblance to the surviving portraits or photographs of her, the disproportionate initials allude to someone important, and the duchess's crown would not be unusual, since in exile Maria Cristina always identified herself as Duchess of Riansares, a title that afforded her greater freedom of movement, especially in business. The lack of documentation on this work is not surprising, as Leticia Azcue points out, since Moratilla has not been properly valued or studied, and there is hardly any bibliography about him. Felipe Moratilla was the son of Francisco Moratilla, the famous silversmith and jeweler to Queen Isabella II. He trained at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando and around 1848 received a scholarship to study in Rome, a stay he was able to extend from 1856 with an official government grant. He lived in Rome for practically his entire life, where he had a studio on Via Margutta, the most important street for artists, but he traveled frequently to Madrid. He received several awards and accolades, and the Prado Museum houses some of his works. The spectacular sphinxes flanking the entrance to the National Archaeological Museum of Madrid are also his creations. In 1874, he was appointed to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Rome, and in 1899, he served on the commission to select the works of Spanish sculptors for the Universal Exposition in Paris. In the last quarter of the 19th century, he was the most prominent sculptor in Italy, receiving numerous commissions and creating works for the Roman exhibitions. In 1861, Queen Maria Cristina of Bourbon, already in exile, helped him financially, as Moratilla had three children, hiring him to do work on the palace she had bought for her daughter Milagros, Marchioness of Castillejo, married to the Italian prince Filippo Massimiliano del Drago, near the Church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane. Later, in 1866, she commissioned him to create the funerary monument for three of her children, located in the French cemetery of Rueil-Malmaison, near the Château de Malmaison, which she acquired with her morganatic husband, Agustín Muñoz, Duke of Riansares, after their exile in 1840. Height: 77 cm Bibliography: Carlos Reyero "The Sculpture of Eclecticism in Spain. Cosmopolitans between Rome and Paris 1850-1900. Collection of Studies, UAM Editions; María Soto "The Spanish Academy in Rome and the Spanish Sculptural Renewal (1873-1900); Leticia Azcue, "Spanish Sculpture towards the turn of the century and some of its protagonists in the Prado Museum: Felipe Moratilla and Agapito Vallmitjana; José Luís Mendieras Gimeno IES "Prado Mayr", Totana Murcia "The Work in Rome of the Sculptor Felipe Moratilla", XV National Congress of Art History (CEHA) models, exchanges and artistic reception (from maritime routes to network navigation), Palma October 2004.