Retrato de María Riquelme

Retrato de María Riquelme, painted in 1896 and held at the Centre de Documentació i Museu de les Arts Escèniques in Barcelona, depicts a figure from the Catalan theatrical world—a subject that connects directly to Santiago Rusiñol's lifelong engagement with theatre and dramatic art. Rusiñol was not only a painter but a playwright of significance within the Catalan Modernista movement, and his connections to the theatrical world were personal and professional rather than merely observational. María Riquelme was a figure in the Spanish theatrical sphere of the 1890s, and her portrait by Rusiñol places the work at the intersection of his artistic and theatrical identities. The collection at the Centre de Documentació i Museu de les Arts Escèniques—devoted to the history of the performing arts—is the ideal institutional home for such a work, preserving it within the cultural context from which it emerged.

Theatrical subjects invited Rusiñol to engage with the performative dimension of portraiture—the sitter as someone accustomed to being looked at, who brings to the painter's scrutiny a professional ease before an audience. His technique in 1896 shows the full development of his Post-Impressionist manner, with looser paint handling and more expressive colour than his early portraits.