PAUL SIGNAC AND PAINTING IN FRANCE, BELGIUM AND SPAIN AROUND 1900
REGOYOS, Darío de (Ribadesella, 1857 – Barcelona, 1913)
The Passing of the Train
1902
Oil sobre canvas, 35 x 55 cm
Colección Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza
The Passing of the Train is a scene set in Ategorrieta, close to San Sebastian, and was executed in the autumn of the same year in which the artist moved there from Irun.
The autumn atmosphere is perfectly captured by the absence of leaves on the trees and the lack of sun, which means there are no shadows. Regoyos loved the Basque Country for its muted light that allowed him to capture it in all of its variations and to take nature as the best model for his oils. As an Impressionist, he believed that an artist did not have to travel to paint different scenes, and that he only needed to observe changes in the light or in time. Since his beginnings as a painter he felt especially attracted to railway–related subjects and painted dozens of works on this theme. In all of them Regoyos demonstrated great ability at painting the steam produced by trains, as we see here, where the steam also serves to indicate the movement of the train, without having to actually represent the engine. Possibly the artist wished to avoid the presence a machine would break the landscape’s natural harmony, considering the wooden carriages to be less discordant.
This manner of composing a landscape is repeated in another work painted later, The Port of Pasajes, in which he simply left the steam and the rails to indicate the train’s recent passing.
Finally, Regoyos also captures the sense of daily life in this work by means of two women that watch the train as it passes, suggesting curiosity or a wish to travel and the monotony of life outside the city.
Juan San Nicolás
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