Luisa Ignacia Roldán

Spanish sculptor Luisa Roldán (c.1650–c.1706) was a member of a family of prominent sculptors and herself the first recognized female sculptor in Spain. Although her life was often marred by deprivation and hardship, she dedicated herself to sculpture and served for several years in the Spanish court, first under Charles II and later Philip V. Roldán is particularly recognized for her terracotta figure groupings, a format she innovated and which are now considered an early version of the Rococo porcelain grouping.

Luisa Ignacia Roldán, also called La Roldána in her native Spain, was born around 1650 in Seville, Spain. Her parents, sculptor Pedro Roldán and his wife, Teresa Ortega y Villavicencio, had relocated to Seville from Granada in 1646. The young Roldán grew up surrounded by artistry; her father, active throughout Spain in the mid-to-late seventeenth century, is recognized as one of Spain's finest Baroque sculptors. According to Grove Art Online, his "achievement was to continue and develop the style of wood sculpture in Seville, and his work anticipates 18th-century styles in its naturalism and emotive power;" in this, his influence on his daughter's work can readily be seen. Roldán received her early training in the Seville workshop of her father and later collaborated with him. The family workshop included not only Roldán and her father, but also one sister and two brothers who helped with the sculpting and a sister who painted the finished pieces.

As a teenager, Roldán married an artist in her father's workshop, Luis Antonio Navarro de los Arcos. This marriage seems to have been disapproved of by her family, particularly her father, who did not attend either her wedding ceremony or the later wedding blessing. Shortly before her marriage, Roldán left the family studio, presumably because of familial disapproval of her match; she and her husband lived for several years in the home of his family in the San Vicente parish of Seville. During these early years of her marriage spent at her husband's family's home, Roldán gave birth to the majority of her children: Luisa Andrea, Fernando Maximo, Fabiana Sebastiana, and Maria Petronila Gertrudis. Additionally, Roldán had one son and one daughter who did not survive infancy long enough to receive names.

In 1680, having lived with Navarro de los Arcos' family for almost a decade, Roldán, her husband and their children at last moved into their own home. This house, although rented, was located in Seville's most upscale neighborhood indicating the family's confidence in their continued success as sculptors. At this time, Seville—like most of Spain—was in the throes of an economic depression, with many inhabitants suffering from a lack of even the basic necessities for survival. However, Roldán and her family seemed to have escaped the deprivations typical of their day. Despite this relatively elevated status, they were not immune from tragedy; in 1683, two of Roldán's daughters, Luisa Andrea and Fabiana Sebastiana, died within a month of each other at the ages of ten and six, respectively. Although the official causes of death are unknown, the close chronological proximity of the two deaths point to one of the illnesses rampant in the depressed area at the time. A little under a year after the deaths of these two daughters, Roldán gave birth to her final child, another daughter named Rosa Maria Josepha.

Worked with Husband

After their marriage, Roldán and Navarro de los Arcos had left Pedro Roldán's family studio and set up as independent artists, with Roldán acting as a sculptor and her husband serving as a polychromist, or a painter of sculptures, pottery and other three-dimensional pieces. Navarro de los Arcos received his first independent commission in 1674 to construct a float which would support a later sculpture; undoubtedly, Roldán assisted in the creation of this piece. Roldán herself did not receive any independent commissions during this stage of her career; in seventeenth century Spain, respect and demand for women artists was practically non-existent, although female artists did work in the trade. This was exemplified by Roldán and her sisters, who had all served in her father's workshop. Roldán worked closely with her husband, however, and did produce pieces despite the lack of personal commissions. Overall, few pieces from these years in Seville survive, among them four polychrome wooden angels and two thieves made in 1683 and 1684 and a sculpture of Seville's patron saint, the "Virgen de la Macarena." (While this latter piece cannot be definitely attributed to Roldán, it is typically assumed to be her work.)

Commissioned at Cádiz

Sometime around 1684, Roldán and her family moved to Cádiz, on the southwestern coast of Spain, where she at last received her first independent commission for a work called Ecce Homo for the Regina Angelorum Convent. The Roldán family returned briefly to Seville in 1685, but came back to Cádiz a year later to accept a commission from that city's cathedral chapter to execute several wooden sculptures. These sculptures, now located in the crypt of the Catedral Vieja, include depictions of six to eight angels, the seven cardinal and theological Virtues, and several prophets. Upon completion of those, Roldán accepted a 1687 commission from the city to make two polychrome wooden statues of Cádiz's patron saints, St. Servandus and St. Germanus. The two saints lived under Roman rule and were persecuted for their Christian faith, finally being put to death at or near Cádiz around the turn of the fourth century. In the early seventeenth century, they were declared the patron saints of Cádiz. These sculptures were a family effort, with Pedro Roldán designing them, Luisa Roldán sculpting them and her husband painting them.

Tooka Court Position

Once her work in Cádiz was complete, Roldán moved to Spain's capital, Madrid, to petition for the position of Escultora de Cáma, or Sculptor of the Chamber, at King Charles II's court. Roldán was acquainted with a courtier, Don Cristóbal de Hontañón, and with his help received this position, essentially that of Court Sculptor, in 1692; however, it did not come with the customary benefits of a court position. The reign of Charles II—known as Carlos Segundo in Spain—was marked by severe economic hardship and deprivation throughout Spain, at least partially due to the monarch's weakness and general unfitness for rule. These hardships were felt as high as the King's court, leaving Roldán, her husband and their children to struggle to survive even in their privileged surroundings. Initially, Roldán seems to have declined the position because it was offered without pay; however, a few months later, the king bestowed a small salary and residency in a house upon the sculptor. These recompenses do not appear to have been bestowed in fact, but merely given in name. Records reflect Roldán's near-continual petitions for the pay promised to her and for a place for her family to live. By 1698, Roldán's personal circumstances were improving even as Madrid's general population suffered from increasing food shortages.

King Charles II died in 1700, leaving no natural heir. He had designated Phillippe de Bourbon, the French Duke of Anjou and relative of his first wife, as his successor; the line was contested, but Phillippe took the Spanish throne in 1701 as Phillip V of Spain. The new king brought his French artistic tastes with him and was less interested in Roldán's clearly Spanish sculptures than had been his predecessor. Roldán nevertheless sought to have her court position maintained and, despite mixed reviews from court officials, was reaffirmed in her position in October 1701. She had by then spent nearly a decade as a member of the court; although many of those years had been unpaid and marked by deprivation, Roldán had been paid fairly regularly during the last few years of Charles II's reign and did not wish to give up her place at court.

Roldán's works after her court appointment can be readily identified, for she typically signed her pieces not only with her name but with the title "Escultora de Cama" for the rest of her career. In 1692, Roldán received a royal commission to produce a wooden statue of St. Michael for the Royal Monastery. Grove Art Online noted that "this is one of her finest works, combining a dynamic composition with the rich sensuality of the flowing cloak and plumed helmet of the saint and the twisted naked body of Satan under his feet." Other noteworthy works of this period include Roldán's polychrome terracotta figure groups, essentially unknown before the Spanish sculptor.

A few years after Phillip V rose to the throne, Roldán began to suffer from failing health. Sources differ on the year of her death, placing it either in 1704 or 1706, but the most likely date seems to be January 10, 1706; Roldán's will was dated only a few days before that date. Although Roldán had been paid during the last few years of her life and her husband seems to have been fairly wealthy by the time of her death, Roldán claimed in her will that she was a pauper and had nothing to leave to her heirs. It seems likely that this stemmed from Spanish women's inability to control their own assets at that time, rather than actual destitution. Whatever the case may have actually been, Roldán was buried in a pauper's grave in Madrid.

Left Influential Legacy

Although she had no protegés to take over her work, Roldán influenced the upcoming eighteenth-century Spanish style. Roldán's style was based in the lush Baroque elements which dominated the arts in seventeenth-century Europe. The Baroque movement started around the turn of the century in Italy and spread north through the continent; Roldán's group sculptures, with their bright colors, use of gold, and religious themes exemplify the Spanish Baroque style. Roldán's figures are noted for their strong, clear profiles; thick, often curling hair; dreamy-looking faces with furrowed brows and parted lips; and flowing garments. Today, her best-known work is a sculpture of St. Catherine.

In Women Artists, Nancy G. Heller commented that "Roldán's group sculptures have the intimacy of genre scenes," and she added to their charm by including numerous details. For example, in The Death of Saint Mary Magdalene, besides the saint herself, two large angels, and a pair of cherubs, there are the standard still-life elements that identify the subject-Mary's scourge, a skull, and a book-plus a lizard, a snake, an owl, two rabbits nibbling on grass, and some flowers." These stylistic elements are evident in eighteenth-century design aesthetics; the J. Paul Getty Museum's website also argued that "with their bits of still life, flowers, and animals, [Roldán's terracotta groups] prefigured Rococo porcelain groups." As Spain's acknowledged first female sculptor, Roldán laid the groundwork for women to succeed in the arts for years to come.

Books

Hall van den Elsen, Catherine The Life and Work of the Sevillian Sculptor Luisa Roldán (1652–1706) with a Catalogue Raisonné, La Trobe University, 1992.

Heller, Nancy G., Women Artists: An Illustrated History, Abbeville Press, 1987.

Uglow, Jennifer S., ed., The Continuum Dictionary of Women's Biography, Continuum, 1989.

Zilboorg, Caroline, ed., Women's Firsts, Gale, 1997.

Online

Grove Art Online, "Luisa Roldán" http://www.groveart.com, January 20, 2006.

J.P. Getty Museum, "Luisa Roldán" http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artMakerDetails?maker 3503, January 20, 2006.