The construction of the artist's romantic image: Antonio M.ª Esquivel, the painter who was saved

Abstract

During the second third of Spain's turbulent 19th century, the Sevillian artist Antonio Mª Esquivel developed his painting career amidst many difficulties that forged his personal and professional character. Loyal to the nascent liberalism, the artist rose to fame in the capital, where he became one of the leading painters and more active participants in the Liceo Artístico y Literario de Madrid, founded by his friend José Fernández de la Vega. In Madrid he felt the solidarity of his fellow artists after he suffered an illness that temporarily caused him the condition most feared by a painter – blindness. Cured thanks to the generous help of artist friends and admirers, Esquivel then devoted all his efforts to the protection of the Fine Arts. Thus, thanking all those who helped him in his direst straits, and leaving as a legacy the creation of the Society for the Protection of the Fine Arts. His life and his work have become an epitome of the romantic artist who is the subject of novelised biographies, modest and proud at the same time, responsible for the creation of his own image in the eyes of his contemporaries and posterity.