In the foreground of this canvas, a figure dressed in green holds in his hands what appears to be a pack of cards and looks directly at the viewer, as if to invite us to participate in the game. He is in the countryside, seated under the protection of a rocky crag. Behind him is a landscape that ends in a range of mountains on the horizon. Velázquez painted the portrait around 1638, and it presents various features that distinguish it from other European painting from the period: namely, the sitter´s pose and expression, his surroundings and the brushwork. Several of these characteristics are related to the model´s identity and the place for which the painting was presumably executed. The sitter has been identified as Francisco Lezcano, a dwarf from the Basque Country whose relationship to the royal court is documented between 1634 and 1649, the year he died. At the royal palace, he was in the service of Crown Prince Baltasar Carlos. His small stature suggests some sort of physical handicap, which in itself would have made him an object of sufficient curiosity to receive the attention of the king and the court. In addition, however, he seems to have suffered from mental retardation, perhaps due to congenital hypothyroidism or cretinism. The sitter’s identity thus explains his pose and expression. He is seated in a manner that is completely informal and relaxed, in an attitude that would be unthinkable in a portrait of any other sort of person; indeed, his almost insolent gaze would be inappropriate according to the conventions of the genre. Velázquez makes his small stature more evident with the foreshortening of his right leg and by the presence of the wide-brimmed hat beneath his foot, providing a convenient gauge of Lezcano´s size. The technical freedom with which the artist has executed the painting is astonishing. His masterful manner of laying on the colours, of which green tones predominate, combines wide, long brushstrokes with quick touches of the brush that enable him, for example, to produce the prodigious modelling of the sitter´s sleeves. Velázquez used this same highly effective yet summary approach in his representation of Lezcano´s face, in which he has avoided an excessively detailed description of the features, seeking, instead, a more general effect that transcribes not only his expression but also a sense of liveliness. In his portraits of dwarfs and jesters, Velázquez made extraordinary use of the freedom that such subjects afforded him in terms of composition, poses and expressions, making these works among the most extraordinary and artistically liberated in the history of portraiture. The first surviving mention of this painting is from 1701, when it was hung in the Torre de la Parada and was accompanied by three other images of dwarfs by Velázquez. The background suggests it is very likely that the painting was designed to hang in that building, for it is, in fact, clearly recognisable as the western part of the Sierra de Guadarrama mountain range. Mount Abantos is the peak behind his left elbow and, below it, the palace of El Escorial is suggested by a few light touches of white. It is an area of the Guadarrama range that is clearly visible from the Torre de la Parada. Thus, with this painting, Velázquez not only offers us a vera effigies (true image) of a palace dwarf but also a record of the natural scenery around Madrid. This fragment of landscape presents a blend of Velázquez´s remarkable capacity for synthesis as well as his desire to transmit lived experience. The deliberately naturalistic quality in his landscapes distinguishes his art from other European painters´ from this period, and it is a facet of his work that would be much esteemed by artists in the second half of the nineteenth century. Velázquez´s portrait of Francisco Lezcano demonstrates his experimentation in representing the diversity of human expression and his quest for a truthful and frank communication of the sentiments conveyed by a landscape. It is masterpieces such as this one that help us to understand and appreciate this artist´s remarkable uniqueness.

Portrait of Spain. Masterpieces from The Prado, Queensland Art Gallery, 2012, p.94-95, nº8