Lady Bullfighter on a Horse,” c. 1851-2
Oil on canvas
Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, San Juan
Oller’s earliest surviving European painting, below, evinces the duality informing much of his work: It depicts a woman bullfighter in Madrid — an anomaly in a male-dominated field, incongruously placed in a Caribbean setting. You could take the painter out of Puerto Rico, but you often couldn’t take Puerto Rico out of the paintings (palm trees, upper left), even in some that seem overly impressed by Impressionism. More on this painting
Francisco Oller (June 17, 1833 — May 17, 1917) was a Puerto Rican painter. Oller is the only Latin American painter to have played a role in the development of Impressionism. One of the most distinguished transatlantic painters of his day, Oller helped transform painting in the Caribbean…
Zaidan Gallery 