MEIFRÉN Y ROIG, Eliseo - b. 1859 Barcelona, d. 1940 Barcelona

Catalan painter. He was the pupil of Antonio Caba (1838-1907) at the art college in Barcelona. He specialised in Impressionist marine painting

Like many of his Spanish contemporaries, Eliseo Meifrén y Roig was lured to Paris in the fin de siècle to experience the city’s vibrant artistic community. There he discovered the work of the Impressionists and Symbolists which would have a great influence on his own stylistic development. Throughout his life, Meifrén played with the principles of en plein air painting, whether he was looking to capture the streets of Paris or the canals of Venice. While his extensive travels resulted in a great number of well-received works, Meifrén’s best-known images are those inspired by his native Catalonia. The region’s distinctive rocky coast, open sea and small fishing towns appear in many of his paintings filtered through a dreamy lens of swirling brushstrokes and striking modulations of colour.

While in Paris he regularly exhibited at the Salon and at the Galerie Petit. He worked also in Italy, the Canaries and the Balearic Islands. He was director of the art school in Palma de Mallorca.

The Marne

In Spain, it was Catalan art that wholeheartedly adopted Impressionism - even if the Catalan preference for greys, violets, ochres and muted greens recalls Whistler rather than Monet or Renoir. Eliseo Meifr�n y Roig was the leading figure here. Open to new techniques and new ways of seeing, he painted in a relaxed, limpid manner, and his pictures have a strongly Impressionist flavour. He liked painting water, the sea and rivers, beaches and fishing ports, seen in various kinds of light. The present painting recalls Monet, not least through its view of the opposite bank and a line of poplar trees.