Eliseu Meifrèn

Eliseu Meifrèn (also recorded as Eliseo Meifrén y Roig) was born in Barcelona. His birth date is not settled in the historical record: sources give either 24 or 28 December, and either 1857 or 1859, with no single primary document resolving the discrepancy.

He trained at the Escola de la Llotja, the Barcelona school of fine arts, under Antoni Caba and Ramon Marti i Alsina, and several sources say he later completed further training in Paris. No formal degree is documented in any source.

Meifrèn built his reputation through the era's national and international exposition system, winning medals at exhibitions in Barcelona (1896), Madrid (1906), Buenos Aires (1910), San Francisco (1915), and San Diego (1916). One source also credits him with appointment as a Knight of the French Legion of Honour in 1926, and in 1935 the city of Barcelona awarded him the Premi Nonell.

Meifrèn died in Barcelona on 5 February 1940, of pneumonia, and was buried in the Cementiri de Poblenou.

Contemporary accounts describe Meifrèn as being singled out among the strongest artists in the Spanish section of the 1888 Paris Universal Exposition, and later sources consistently frame him as one of the figures who introduced Impressionist technique into Catalan painting. No exact, sourced verbatim quotation from a named critic in a major outlet could be confirmed for this profile, so none is reproduced here; the critical picture instead rests on his sustained record of medals at national and international exhibitions across four decades and his later honors, including the Legion of Honour and the Premi Nonell.

Meifrèn's auction market is modest in volume but has produced at least one substantial result. According to compiled auction data, his painting Regatas en el puerto de Barcelona sold for EUR 437,600, described as the artist's highest recorded auction result to date; the sale is dated to October 2005, though the specific auction house and city are not confirmed in available sources. By comparison, Noche en Cadaques sold for USD 122,500 at Christie's New York in November 2012, illustrating a large gap between his single top result and his more typical range. His work continues to circulate through Spanish auction platforms such as Setdart and through dealers including Galeria Jordi Pascual in Barcelona and MacConnal-Mason Gallery in London, though no formal estate representation has been identified.

There is no published catalogue raisonne for Meifrèn, so attribution and authentication depend on signature analysis ("E. Meifren"), provenance, and the expertise of auction houses that regularly handle his work. His single documented top result, EUR 437,600 in 2005, is far above his typical range, and the auction house and exact date of that sale are not fully confirmed in public sources, so it should be treated as a data point rather than a reliable market floor. Collectors should also note that his birth year is genuinely disputed in the scholarly and institutional record; this does not affect the well-documented facts of his death in Barcelona in 1940 or his broad museum holdings, but it is worth knowing before relying on any single source for his exact dates.