- It is one of the most interesting nineteenth-century collections in this field, and is on offer to the Valencian public until 25 May.
- The exhibition offers 52 pieces, including corsets, doublets, jackets, jackets and dresses, as well as fabrics, accessories and even a rare corset for pregnant women.
- Councillor José Luis Moreno emphasised that the project ‘has made it possible to carry out a monographic study of the collection for the first time and to invest in its conservation, which has a positive effect on the value of our collective textile heritage’.
From today, the Benlliure House-Museum is showing the public its collection of Valencian costumes and textiles, which form part of the collection of costume pieces put together by the painter José Benlliure Gil. This is one of the most interesting nineteenth-century collections in our geographical area in this field, and is on offer to the Valencian public from today until 25th May in the former residence and studio of the Benlliure family, in Blanquerías street.
The councillor for Cultural Action, José Luis Moreno, this morning attended the opening of the exhibition, which is curated by the expert Josep Manuel Sabater, collector and researcher of historic fabrics. Moreno invited the public to come to the House-Museum to enjoy this cultural proposal ‘which shows for the first time to the public a selection of the numerous textile collections that the painter José Benlliure Gil amassed in the course of his professional activity’.
José Benlliure Gil (Canyamelar 1855 – Valencia 1937), a painter of considerable international renown, devoted most of his output to genre and costume painting. The characteristics of his style, in keeping with the bourgeois taste of the time, full of details and apparent realism, led him to accumulate in his studio a multitude of objects of the most varied condition, from furniture to weapons, ceramics or clothing and costumes, to use them as props in the execution of his paintings.
As the expert Josep Manuel Sabater explained, one of the elements that aroused most interest among critics and buyers of genre paintings at the time was precisely the clothing worn by the figures. For this reason, José Benlliure, like most of his colleagues, procured, as far as he could, a large number of coats, djellabas, chasubles and traditional clothes, both Spanish and Italian, with which to lend veracity, colour and variety to his paintings, depending on their subject matter.
The current collection of clothing and textiles in the Benlliure House Museum is made up of these pieces, which were bought specifically at the end of the 19th century by José Benlliure to serve as props for his paintings, as well as some pieces for personal use and household linen. The total of the collection exceeds six hundred pieces, although, its promoter has stressed, the interest of these is very uneven.
Hats, jackets, dresses… and a maternity corset.
The exhibition on display in the temporary exhibition hall of the Benlliure House Museum is a first selection of 52 pieces, comprising both clothing and fabrics. The pieces of clothing include corsets, doublets, jackets and jackets, both female and male, of international and popular fashion, made in the 18th and 19th centuries. Also included are two Empire-style dresses from the early 19th century, and a third from the mid-19th century. Among these pieces are some truly unique pieces, such as an 18th century silk satin corset for a pregnant woman, of which there are hardly any other examples in European public collections. Also on display is a doublet in quadrillé taffeta dating from around 1785, of which only a few pieces remain.
In the fabrics section, there is an umbrella, probably Eucharistic, from the late 17th or early 18th century, very scarce; or a carved velvet, of complex technical elaboration, on a drawing by Vicente López, from the late 18th century, of Valencian manufacture, representing the blessing of Saint Francis of Assisi; or an 18th century silk satin with the bars of Aragon and the heraldic emblems of the city of Valencia.
The exhibition also includes a section displaying a number of accessories such as popular aprons, one of which was used by Pepita Samper in 1929, and a luxurious North African hizam or sash, bought by José Benlliure during his stay in Morocco in 1897. The exhibition is completed with a miscellany dedicated to the footwear in the collection, which includes some women’s party shoes worn by José Benlliure’s daughters (of local – Casa Bataller – and European manufacture), a pair of richly decorated babouches, or a spectacular 18th century chinela (flat shoe), made of embroidered silk damask.
Restoration of the pieces
The València City Council has had the collaboration of the Conselleria de Educación, Cultura, Universidades y Empleo de la Generalitat, the IVCR+I and the Instituto de Restauración del Patrimonio de la Universitat Politècnica de València for the restoration and conditioning of the pieces. The curator of the exhibition, the historical fabrics and clothing researcher Josep Manuel Sabater Salvador, is also responsible, together with Mercè Fernández, for the exhibition El temps de la Seda, which was hosted in 2017 by the National Museum of Ceramics ‘González Martí’. Sabater is also director of the course ‘L’art del vellut: 600 anys de dissenys, lligaments i teixits’ and author of several articles on the subject.
The councillor for Cultural Action, José Luis Moreno, stressed that the exhibition ‘Clothing and textiles in the collections of the Benlliure House Museum’ is part of the exhibition line defined by the museum, ‘and is aimed at raising awareness of the rich and varied material heritage that the museum houses, which – he stressed – goes beyond its painting collection’. In addition, added the mayor, ‘the exhibition offers visitors the unusual opportunity to enjoy a textile collection in its creator’s own living space’.
Moreno concluded by stressing that the development of this project ‘has made it possible to carry out for the first time a monographic study of this collection and to invest in its conservation, which undoubtedly has a positive effect on the value of our collective textile heritage’.
The exhibition ‘Clothing and textiles in the collections of the Benlliure House-Museum’ can be seen from this afternoon in the Temporary Exhibition Hall of the Benlliure House-Museum, at number 23 Blanquerias Street. It will remain open to the public until 25th May from Tuesday to Saturday, from 10:00 to 14:00 and from 15:00 to 19:00; and on Sundays and public holidays: from 10:00 to 14:00.