Julio Moisés Fernández de Villasante

Tortosa (Tarragona), 1888 - Suances (Cantabria), 1968

Julio Moisés Fernández de Villasante spent his childhood and adolescence in Galicia and Cadiz, where he studied Fine Arts and commenced his studies in painting. He obtained various awards and received commissions like that of decorating the city’s Gran Teatro.

In 1912, he moved to Barcelona and in his first participation in a National Fine Arts Exhibition he obtained third prize. He received second and first prize in the 1915 and 1920 editions, respectively. He also won prizes at the International Exhibitions in San Francisco (1915) and Panama (1916). His work continued to be exhibited throughout his life, and he had a number of individual exhibitions which in the thirties took him to Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina.

Having moved to Madrid in 1920, he taught for various years after founding Academia Libre de Arte in 1923. Students such as Salvador Dalí attended the academy, and he was commissioned by the Royal Family to make a portrait of King Alfonso XIII and Queen Victoria Eugenia.

The central theme of his work was genre painting and portraits of women, a balanced mixture of costumbrismo and folklore. An example of this was "Mujer con garrafa en la mano" (Woman with a Pitcher in Her Hand) which he made in 1945 for the UEE calendar and which, continuing in the collection’s iconographic tradition, contributed its very own vision of the ideals of feminine beauty.

His talent was rewarded when he was appointed as the Director of the School of Fine Arts in Madrid in 1946 and the San Fernando Royal Academy in 1947.

1945 Julio Moisés Woman with a Pitcher in Her Hand Oil on canvas 59 x 42 cm.