José Camarón Bonanat, or Bononat (18 May 1731,

Segorbe Segorbe is a municipality in the mountainous coastal province of Castelló, autonomous community of Valencia, Spain. The former Palace of the Dukes of Medinaceli now houses the city's mayor. Segorbe's bull-running week (''semana de Toros'') in Se ...

- 14 July 1803,

Valencia Valencia ( va, València) is the capital of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Valencian Community, Valencia and the Municipalities of Spain, third-most populated municipality in Spain, with 791,413 inhabitants. It is ...

) was a Spanish draftsman, painter and engraver. Most early sources give his maternal family name as Boronat.

Life and works

His father, , was a sculptor and gave him his first art lessons. Later, in Valencia, he continued his studies with his uncle, Mosén Eliseo Bonanat (1697-1761), who created

portrait miniatures A portrait miniature is a miniature portrait painting, usually executed in gouache, watercolor, or enamel. Portrait miniatures developed out of the techniques of the miniatures in illuminated manuscripts, and were popular among 16th-century el ...

, and with the painter,

Miguel Posadas Miguel Posadas (1711–1753) was a Spanish painter. He was born in Aragon, and became a Dominican friar living at Valencia Valencia ( va, València) is the capital of the autonomous community of Valencia and the third-most populated munic ...

, who was also a Dominican friar. In 1752, he relocated to Madrid to complete his studies. Initially, he devoted himself to miniatures, landscapes, and copies of the

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

masters, such as

Titian Tiziano Vecelli or Vecellio (; 27 August 1576), known in English as Titian ( ), was an Italians, Italian (Republic of Venice, Venetian) painter of the Renaissance, considered the most important member of the 16th-century Venetian school (art), ...

Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque traditio ...

and Murillo. In 1754, he returned to Valencia, where he participated in an exhibition at the newly created

Academia de Bellas Artes de Santa Bárbara The Academia de Bellas Artes de Santa Bárbara was an art school located in Valencia, Spain, founded in 1753 by decree of King Ferdinand VI of Spain The school which was located in the University of Valencia building was named after Barbara of Po ...

, and was named a Professor there. He maintained his contacts with Madrid, however, and was accepted as an honorary member of the

Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando The Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando (RABASF; ), located on the Calle de Alcalá in the heart of Madrid, currently functions as a museum and gallery. A public law corporation, it is integrated together with other Spanish royal acad ...

in 1762. Shortly after, he was among the founders of the

Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Carlos de Valencia The Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Carlos de Valencia (Spanish for ''Saint Charles Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Valencia'') has been a Spanish Art school in Valencia since 1768. History The institution is deemed to be the follow-on instit ...

where, upon the death of

Cristóbal Valero Cristóbal Valero (1707 in Alboraya – December 1789) was a Spanish painter and presbyter. Biography He originally studied philosophy, but also trained as a painter with Evaristo Muñoz. He then went to Rome to study under Sebastiano Conca. He ...

, he became the Director of Painting. From 1796 to 1801, he served as General Director. He resigned, following several trips to Madrid to treat his eyes for an unspecified ailment. He was a friend of the jurist and writer,

Francisco Pérez Bayer Francisco Pérez Bayer (1711–1794) was a Spanish philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with esp ...

, who commissioned him to decorate the church of Saint

Thomas of Villanova Thomas of Villanova (1488 – September 8, 1555), born Tomás García y Martínez, was a Spanish people, Spanish friar of the Order of Saint Augustine who was a noted preacher, asceticism, ascetic and religious writer of his day. He became an ar ...

, which was under construction in

Benicàssim Benicàssim (; es, Benicasim ; ar, بنو قاسم, translit=banū qāsim, or ar, بني قاسم, translit=banī qāsim, label=none, according to numismatic findings) is a municipality and beach resort located in the province of Castelló (p ...

; a project that occupied him from the late 1760s until 1776. He also participated in creating a major cycle of paintings at the

Basilica of San Francisco el Grande, Madrid The Royal Basilica of Saint Francis the Great ( es, Real Basílica de San Francisco el Grande) is a Roman Catholic church in central Madrid, Spain, located in the neighborhood of Palacio. The main façade faces the Plaza of San Francisco, at the ...

. Also notable are the altarpieces at

Valencia Cathedral Valencia Cathedral, at greater length the Metropolitan Cathedral–Basilica of the Assumption of Our Lady of Valencia ( es, Iglesia Catedral-Basílica Metropolitana de la Asunción de Nuestra Señora de Valencia, ca-valencia, Església Cated ...

and the

fresco Fresco (plural ''frescos'' or ''frescoes'') is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaste ...

es he began at

Segorbe Cathedral The Cathedral of the Assumption of Our Lady of Segorbe ( es, Catedral de la Asunción de la Virgen) is a Roman Catholic church in Segorbe, province of Castellón, Spain. It is the see of the Diocese of Segorbe-Castellon. It was elevated to the r ...

in 1800. They were unfinished when he died, and were completed by his son, Manuel, in 1806. Despite his focus on religious works, his

genre Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...

scenes, in

Rococo Rococo (, also ), less commonly Roccoco or Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and theatrical style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, ...

style, are his best known, as well as the illustrations he designed for a 1777 edition of ''

Don Quixote is a Spanish epic novel by Miguel de Cervantes. Originally published in two parts, in 1605 and 1615, its full title is ''The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha'' or, in Spanish, (changing in Part 2 to ). A founding work of Wester ...

''. He was married to Juliana Meliá in 1758, and they had five children. In addition to Manuel, his eldest son, , also became a painter.

Sources

Biography
in the Enciclopedia en línea @ the

Museo del Prado The Prado Museum ( ; ), officially known as Museo Nacional del Prado, is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It is widely considered to house one of the world's finest collections of European art, dating from the ...

Biography
@ the

Real Academia de la Historia The Real Academia de la Historia (RAH, 'Royal Academy of History') is a Spanish institution in Madrid that studies history "ancient and modern, political, civil, ecclesiastical, military, scientific, of letters and arts, that is to say, the diff ...

Scholarly articles
about José Camarón Bonanat both in web an
PDF
@ th
Spanish Old Masters Gallery

External links

"David Montolío desvela secretos del arte de José Camarón"
@ InfoPalancia
Digitalized works
in the Biblioteca Digital Hispánica of the

Biblioteca Nacional de España The Biblioteca Nacional de España (''National Library of Spain'') is a major public library, the largest in Spain, and one of the largest in the world. It is located in Madrid, on the Paseo de Recoletos. History The library was founded by ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Camaron y Bononat, Jose 1731 births 1803 deaths People from Segorbe Painters from the Valencian Community 18th-century Spanish painters 18th-century Spanish male artists Spanish male painters 19th-century Spanish painters 19th-century Spanish male artists