Josep Tapiró Baró's Watercolor Portraits

Josep Tapiró Baró (1836 - 1913) was a Spanish painter known for his watercolor portraits of indigenous North-African people. (He is also known as José Tapiró y Baró)

His paintings push the limits of closely observed portraits in watercolor.

Up close, the textures are layered and the brushwork is varied, giving an iridescent sheen to surfaces like the skin and the shells, and a dry softness to the hair and fabric.

Here's a Berber bride, painted in 1896. The original is in Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya - MNAC, Barcelona. I don't know how long such a portrait would take, but the reserves of patience of both the artist and the model boggles the mind. Google Cultural Institute has a file of this image that can be scaled way up to see the smaller details. 

He was a friend of the painter Marià Fortuny, and once saved him from drowning. 

 

Apart from their technical virtuosity and artistic quality, his paintings are sensitive human portraits, capturing the quiet dignity of his subjects.

Tapiró was one of the first Spanish artists to live in Tangier, Morocco. He settled there in 1876 until his death in 1913, and witnessed great changes as the colonial powers exerted their influence on local cultural traditions.

The National Museum of Cataluna had an exhibition of his work last summer.

If you liked this post, you'll also enjoy Eugène Burnand's World War I Portraits