Richly illustrated, this is the first study in English to explore the longevity of Orientalist art in Spain over a period of 120 years. It highlights how artists in Spain shaped perceptions of Al-Andalus (Iberia under Islam 711-1492) and northern Morocco, from Spain's liberal revolution of the 1830s to the end of the Protectorate of Morocco in 1956. Combining art history with a cultural studies approach, and using exemplary case studies, Hopkins foregrounds the diverse issues that underpin Orientalist expression: reflections on history and the nation, cultural nationalism, gender and sexuality, aesthetics and art commerce, colonialism and racial thinking. In the process, the book challenges over-familiar understandings of Western Orientalism. Beyond Fortuny and Sorolla, many unfamiliar artists and exhibitions are introduced, amongst them Villaamil, whose nostalgic landscapes evoked the loss of Andalusi culture; Bécquer, who celebrated Spanish-Moroccan peace-making through the lens of Velázquez; the Symbolist Rusiñol, whose images of the Alhambra are infused with melancholy; Morcillo, whose extraordinary camp images opened a new space for male subjectivity; Tapiró and Bertuchi, who dedicated their lives to Morocco, and the Moroccan Sarghini, who participated in the state-funded Painters of Africa exhibitions in Franco's Madrid - an annual exhibition that served the colonial concept of a Hispano-Moroccan brotherhood under the dictatorship. This book traces the shifting impulses and meanings of Orientalist expression in Spain. It makes an original intervention in the field of Spanish art studies and contributes new material to the ongoing debates about Western Orientalism.

Richly illustrated with exotic images, ranging from Moorish palaces fantastically imagined by the Romantic painter Genaro Pérez Villaamil to paintings of everyday life in colonial Morocco by Mariano Bertuchi, this is the first history of Spanish Orientalist art in English. It shows how artists visualized Spain's Islamic past (711-1492) and their nearest "Orient" in Morocco for audiences at home and abroad. With the exception of Fortuny, the book introduces many unfamiliar figures, such as Francisco Iturrino, who travelled with Matisse to Morocco, producing novel visions of the exotic. The state-funded annual Pintores de Africa exhibitions, never examined before, provide a vital perspective on how art served Franco's colonial politics based on a "Hispano-Moroccan brotherhood". Hopkins reveals that Spanish Orientalism was inflected by diverse issues (such as national identity, gender anxieties, colonialism, aesthetics) and put to a wide range of uses. The familiar understanding of Western Orientalism in terms of distinct opposition (East/West) is challenged.