Place Pigalle

Born into a prominent family, the Catalan painter Francisco Miralles y Galup had a regrettably short career, dying at his easel when he was only 53 years old. Miralles expressed interest in becoming an artist from a young age, and while his family wanted him to go into the family business, they finally relented and allowed him to enter the studio of Ramon Martí Alsina when he was 14 years old. When Miralles turned 18, his parents financially supported a move to Paris where the artist was to find considerable success, and where he would remain for more than 30 years. Working in a style inspired by painters like Jean Béraud, Alfred Stevens, and his fellow Catalan painter Mariano Fortuny y Marsal, Miralles’s paintings capture the stylish life of Parisian high society during the Belle Époque.