The Virgin and the Christ Child piercing the heart of Saint Augustine, before the community of Augustinians
1663 - 1711. Oil on canvas.On display elsewhere
This work is part of a set of 27 paintings on the Life of Saint Augustine. The set decorated the lower main cloister of the Convent of San Felipe el Real (Madrid). This work was commissioned to José García Hidalgo, who apparently painted it in collaboration with Alonso del Arco between 1663 and 1711. The works related to this cycle in the Museo del Prado´s holdings to date are: P003268, P003770 (sketch), P004096, P004754, P004755, P005055, P005117, P005508, P005862 (and its sketch P003514), P006124, P006126, P006135, P006971, and P007490. The main iconographic source for García Hidalgo´s work was the prints by the Flemish engraver Schelte Adams Bolswert. These helped to correctly identify many of the scenes in the cycle, whose iconographic motifs had been forgotten and mistaken since the time of the Spanish confiscation. One of the two male figures witnessing the mystical scene on the right of the composition, could in its individualized features, be a portrait of the figure of Father Flórez, illustrious inhabitant of the Convent of San Felipe el Real, from where García Hidalgo´s work comes.
Iturbe Sáiz, Antonio, Patrimonio artístico de tres conventos agustinos en Madrid antes y después de la desamortización de Mendizábal. Actas del Simposium La desamortización: el expolio del patrimonio artístico y cultural de la Iglesia en España, San Lorenzo del Escorial, Madrid, R.C.U. Escorial-Mª Cristina, Servicio de Publicaciones, 2007, p.335-368
