Two Inhabitants of the Valencia Huerta

This work is a typical genre portrayal of Valencian local customs. The subject matter, of a conversation in front of a farmhouse, was frequent in Agrasot’s painting. Prominent were his preciosity and eye for detail as he revelled in depicting the colourful and exotic qualities of the traditional dress, which made his pictures so attractive to those outside the Valencian rural world. Agrasot’s work focused on genre scenes (which Francisco María Tubino - not satisfied with this name – unsuccessfully wanted to call “pictures of varieties”, as his great friend Fortuny had done in París). However, the fact that Argasot was settled in Valencia, meant that the themes of his works were not typical of the tableautins (small pictures) of the period, but rather of the huerta of Valencia (and on occasions, of Aragón). They were executed with meticulousness at the service of an image of folklore linked to the popularism with Romantic roots that decades previously English and French travellers had discovered in the Peninsula and had made fashionable abroad.