The compositions dedicated to beach activities are probably the best known works of Joaquín Sorolla (1863-1923). Always painted en plein air (for the painter, summer was actually his busiest period), it was these works that brought him the most success in his national and international exhibitions.
The exhibition organized by Fundación MAPFRE as part of the celebrations marking the centenary of Joaquín Sorolla’s death, in collaboration with the Museo Sorolla and the Fundación Museo Sorolla, brought together a careful selection of 40 works, half of them small-format. This catalog, published in conjunction with the exhibition, includes both his early scenes, which focus on coastal occupations, underlining the role of the sea as a way of life, as well as an interesting depiction of how the sea environment evolved in relation to the therapeutic properties of bathing and the emergence of the summer as a period of leisure and sociability.