The Faithful Friend

Country: Spain

Manufactory: Lladro

Date of establishment: 2013

Sculptor: Alfredo Llorens

Size (cm): 37*49

Limited Series

Porcelain Story

The province of Granada, Spain, coincides in early May with one of the greatest annual festivals that take place in the country. When I heard the name of this festival, which is part of the festivities, at first I thought I had misheard. I decided to check. And it turned out that no, I hadn't. That's exactly what it's called, a festival of "wine horses".

Many centuries ago, back in the 13th century, when Granada was under the yoke of the Moorish rulers, the little town of Caravaca de la Cruz was under a long siege. Drinking water ran out. People were drinking water from muddy puddles and an epidemic was beginning to break out. The Knights Templar decided to break through the Muslim cordons on their war horses to smuggle wine into the besieged city. They succeeded. The wine, in which they dipped a Christian shrine - the sacred cross of Vera Cruz - was then added to contaminated bodies of water. The water in them immediately became, as legend has it, spring-clear. The inhabitants were saved. The city survived and the enemies retreated.

Since then, the city, which according to the statement of Pope John Paul II, belongs, along with Rome and Jerusalem, to the five most sacred places on earth, began to hold a festival of "wine horses". I have read a great deal about this festival. I have also seen reports from it. But I haven't managed to visit it yet. Though I can imagine how swiftly the horses, laden with wine, escorted by their riders on foot overcome the short, but very steep path to the top of the mountain...

Today's beautiful porcelain composition may remind attentive readers of our rubric of a similarly large work, which I exhibited for your review a few months ago. They are very similar. And the same big head of a horse, and the same beautiful girl clinging to it... But they are completely different. And not just because they are 20 or even 30 years apart in "age". The point is that the use of the latest porcelain production technologies in this work allowed the authors to demonstrate the finest details and the new colour scheme of the modern product in a completely different way. But these two compositions look especially striking when standing side by side. As in our museum exhibit.