An unpublished portrait of José de San Martín has appeared in France | the Chronicle

José de San Martin he is perhaps the most representative historical figure of our country. May be Juan Domingo Peron, more here in time, presents himself as another great modern figure. However, No one is going to deny that San Martín is the great liberator of South America.

The Argentine hero is so important that his portraits are kept in some of the most important art galleries in the world. A Peruvian art collector who walked the streets of Paris a month ago, in the Opera district and has not entered an emblem of the district like the famous Galleries LafayetteInstead, it was introduced at number 3, rue de Provence.

There is the art gallery Baron Ribeyre & Associates. This subject looked at the works on display and was almost amazed when he came across a portrait of a famous man in history. The man must have looked and re-examined the painting because the image was not similar to the five other portraits known to him.

But the writing at the top of the painting left no doubt: the man represented was José de San Martín. Peruvian historian Juan Luis Orrego Penagos was the man who discovered this story and captured it in a newspaper article Trade, from Peru.

It is believed that there are several portraits of San Martín but of his own free will he only posed five times (others say that number is eight). Among those known, four are artistic and one “photographic”.

According to Orrego Penagos, among the first are those of José Gil de Castro (1818), Jean-Henri Simon (1824, numismatic coin), Jean-Joseph Navez (around 1824) and that attributed to Jean Baptiste Madou (around 1828).

The “photographic” is the daguerreotype of 1848, captured in Paris, shortly before his death. With the exception of Simon’s medal, the other portraits are part of the collection of the National Historical Museum of Buenos Aires.

The new portrait found in the streets of Paris is an oil painting measuring 40.5 x 32 centimeters. He is in excellent condition with the exception of a scratch on the general’s right forearm.

When was it painted?

It is believed to have taken place in Belgium, where San Martín lived between 1824 and 1831. According to the website of the Argentine Embassy in that country, San Martín ended up in Brussels at the end of 1824 with the he idea of ​​staying there for a few years to finish her granddaughter’s studies and get away from the anarchy and political instability that had reigned in the Río de La Plata until then.