Garcia Lorca

During the Spanish Civil War the Spanish poet and writer, Garcia Lorca, wrote a number of poems
full of fear and melancholy. They inspired Willem Hofhuizen to create six paintings
expressing the same mood in a very poignant way.

Virgin in a crinoline
Oil on canvas 60x70
1977

Procession

Virgin in a crinoline,
Virgin of Solitude,
spreading immensely
like a tulip-flower.

In your boat of light,
go -
through the high seas
of the city.
through turbulent singing,
through crystalline stars.
Virgin in a crinoline
through the roadway’s river
you go,
down to the sea!

Hundred lonely riders
Oil on canvas 60x70
1977

Journey

A hundred riders in mourning,
where might they be going,
along the low horizon
of the orange grove?
They could not arrive
at Sevilla or Cordoba.
Nor at Granada, she who sighs
for the sea.
These drowsy horses
may carry them
to the labyrinth of crosses
where the singing trembles.
With seven nailed sighs,
where might they be going
the hundred Andalusian riders
of the orange-grove?

Garcia Lorca