Missing since the 1970s and recovered after an exhibition held between 2023 and 2024 in Madrid. The search for the lost painting of La Chata, a portrait painted by Joaquín Sorolla of Isabel de Borbón y Borbón in 1908, ended this February after more than 50 years.
The National Police recovered the painting, which is state property and had remained in the possession of the House of Alba as part of the Palacio de Liria museum’s collection. What’s more, the painting was exhibited to the public between October 2023 and March 2024 as part of the temporary exhibition La Moda en la Casa de Alba (Fashion in the House of Alba).
Along with Sorolla’s painting, two other oil paintings by José Moreno Carbonero have also been located: a portrait of Alfonso XIII and another of Eduardo Dato.
How was the missing Sorolla painting found?
One of the oil paintings by Carbonero found alongside the Sorolla ‖ Editorial credit: National Police
That exhibition was decisive in locating the work of art, as it was the starting point for the investigation. After exhaustive research in archives and libraries, the police informed the current Duke of Alba, Carlos Fitz-James Stuart Martínez de Irujo, of the work they were carrying out.
The link between the House of Alba and Sorolla’s missing painting is an organization that no longer exists: the Spanish Society of Friends of Art, of which the current duke’s father had been an honorary member. This non-profit institution was dedicated to promoting culture and the arts in Spain and had its own assets based on donations.
The society disappeared in the early 1980s and, in the event of dissolution, its statutes stipulate that its assets “should be incorporated into the Spanish State Heritage,“ something that has finally happened after more than half a century.