Self-portrait
1917. Oil on canvas.On display elsewhere
It is the serenity and neat elegance of the figure which stands out in this self-portrait. Impeccably dressed he even wears a hat, a garment more suited to outdoors. His face sports a neat beard and a bushy, pointed moustache. As a self-portrait, it is clearly a glimpse of the habits and manners that define the gentleman. His gesture and bearing are those of a cosmopolitan, cultured and urbane man. He is the successful man whose standing has been recognised by his contemporaries. He has a tense, attentive gaze revealing artist, and the anxious, insatiable viewer, while denoting firmness and great self-assurance.
The scene is set in his studio in Valencia, where a painting with a baroque style frame stands out. The shift of the figure to the right, revealing a part of the painting, is intended to indicate his relationship with the artwork. The whole picture is shrouded in something of a mist and enveloped by in an old-fashioned atmosphere of the familiar and endearing. Gil in this self-portrait, was sixty-two years old, by which time, he had settled back in Valencia. It seems as if the artist had, from the beginning, intended the painting to be donated to the Museo de Arte Moderno, preserving a very carefully cultivated image of bourgeois respectability.
Artistas pintados: retratos de pintores y escultores del siglo XIX en el Museo del Prado, Madrid, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, Dirección Gener, 1997, p.184
