Valencian Fishermen

In 1895 Sorolla carried this canvas down to the shore at Valencia and painted it there, at the water's edge, as evening came on. That can be taken literally. Grains of sand blew into the wet paint and dried in it, and they are still there. It is counted as his second beach picture and the first of them he painted outdoors, the way he would go on working by the sea for the rest of his career. Three fishermen are at work. Two stand in the shallows tending their big wicker traps, and a third sits in a Valencian fishing boat with its sail furled. There are no bathers and no holiday crowds yet. The light is low, and the brush follows what it does on wet shirts, on skin and on the water around the men's legs.