“There, in those barren lands, the snow falls softly, then freezes and settles, waiting for summer to come. Summer arrives, passing through spring, and with a single breath it strikes the poor plants that have begun to sprout, thirst-killing what had previously died from too much water, and dries the leaves, which, still tender, go running into the arms of autumn.
How cold it is once again when October arrives, in those days of such short afternoons that the sun lacks the hours to visit those corners! How sad those gardens become then, beneath that grey, grey sky; those trees so lopped and bare, withered, languid and consumptive in their trunks; those lifeless plants, a sickly green, drained of blood; those convalescent flowers, so drowsy beneath the sky! How the mist rolls among them in its damp stillness! How the smoke from the chimneys descends, tinting everything black and drinking up the colour wherever it goes!”
Rusiñol, Santiago. “Jardins de secà”, in L’Avenç, Barcelona, May 1892, 5, p. 150.
Winter Garden belongs to the first period during which Santiago Rusiñol lived in France, when he settled in Paris, in the district of Montmartre, between 1889 and 1892. In this context, it is hardly surprising that it was there, in the French capital, that he chose to paint a winter landscape, covered in snow, departing entirely from the luminous landscapes he would later produce in Granada and Mallorca. Cool tones prevail throughout the scene, giving the work an almost monochromatic finish and successfully conveying the icy atmosphere of a Parisian winter. A sense of hostility is heightened by the presence of a lonely female figure in the background.
The present landscape was part of the series of works presented by Rusiñol at Sala Parés in Barcelona in November 1891. The exhibition included works by Ramon Casas and Enric Clarasó and was not particularly well received by conservative critics, who regarded the paintings as unfinished works or studies. Nevertheless, Winter Garden was singled out as an example of the direction Rusiñol should pursue. This was not the first time the artist had exhibited his French paintings, characterised by a Naturalist style, in Barcelona. Just a year earlier, he had held his first exhibition, also at Sala Parés, in which he was already exploring some of the themes that reappear in Winter Garden, such as cold, solitude, and poverty.