Eugenio Lucas Villamil was born in 1858 in Madrid, the son of the painter Eugenio Lucas Velázquez (1817-1870), a figure of significance in the history of nineteenth-century Spanish painting. Although the elder Lucas died when his son was only twelve, the young Lucas modeled his style on his father's example. In particular, he continued to produce copies and imitations of the works of Goya, as his father had done.
Lucas Villamil lived a modest life a painter in Madrid until his death in 1918. His major patron was the collector José Lázaro Galdiano, who commissioned him to execute a fresco in his Madrid house, now the Museo Lázaro Galdiano. [Brown, Jonathan, and Richard G. Mann. Spanish Paintings of the Fifteenth through Nineteenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1990: 88.]
Artist Bibliography
1981
Arnaiz, José Manuel. Eugenio Lucas. Su vida y su obra. Madrid, 1981: 190-207.
1990
Brown, Jonathan, and Richard G. Mann. Spanish Paintings of the Fifteenth through Nineteenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1990: 88.