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This opulent still-life scene typical of the Baroque Flemish school includes a human figure and two animals, as was common in the period, in accordance with the tastes of the clients, whose wealth and prosperity was also reflected in this genre of paintings. Snyders´ clientele were members of the nobility and haute bourgeoisie who were interested in his paintings as testimonies to wealth as well a
This scene depicts the moment just prior to Christ’s flagellation when his hands are tied behind his back, revealing his finely painted body. The most restrained of Crespi’s depictions of this episode, it is devoid of the Caravaggesque influence evident in his earlier versions. Philip IV acquired the canvas from the heirs of the Genoese Marquis Giovan Francesco Serra who died in 1656.
This painting is both beautiful in appearance and enigmatic on account of its problems of attribution, its authorship having fluctuated between several artists, all belonging to the aesthetic environment of Michelangelo Merisi, Caravaggio. Indeed, although it is now definitely ascribed to Serodine, some critics still believe it to be the work of the latter. Its history can be traced back to 1647,
This work and its companion (P6413) belonged to Jean de Croy, Count of Solre and captain of the Flemish Royal Guard of Archers, of which Van der Hamen was a member. Unframed, the two paintings hung in De Croy’s Madrid palace, where they flanked the entrance to the painting gallery. As such, they may have served as a trompe l’oeil expansion of the real space, whose floor they probably reproduce. Th
After denying that he was a follower of Christ, Saint Peter repented of his actions. This canvas deploys the chromatic restraint and compositional rigour of Velázquez’s early works, combined here with a freer and more relaxed although equally deft pictorial handling.
Emerging from a dark background, a half-length image of a man appears in the close foreground, his right shoulder and arm bare, his hair white and long, his features aged. He holds a wooden cross in his left hand and with his right he strikes his chest with a stone. The cross identifies him as a saint; his nakedness and dishevelled appearance indicate he is a hermit or a penitent; the stone with w
On entering the Museum this painting was inventoried as a product of the Sevillian school, though the 1876 catalogue lists it as a work executed in the style of Jan Both. Valdivieso (1973) considers it to be an eighteenth-century Italian work, while Barghahn (1986) identifies it as one of the landscapes in the Palace of the Buen Retiro inventory, though in fact neither the measurements nor the des
A broad view of the Flemish countryside, with diverse scenes of peasants carrying out their respective tasks. This is one of the finest examples of the collaboration between Jan Brueghel “the Elder”, who is thought to have painted the figures, and Joos de Momper, who made the landscape. The scene is formed by accumulating various planes that follow each other toward the back, in perspective. The e
This is one of a number of images of Saint Rosalia that Van Dyck painted in Sicily, where he lived from 1624 to 1625. It depicts the hermit saint in her cave on Mount Pellegrino near Palermo. Rosalia’s cult gained popularity during the outbreak of the plague that devastated the city in the 1620s.
This Adoration of the Shepherds, signed and dated 1625, was executed in the final stage in Wtewael`s career. The intellectual approach to the scene (St Luke 2:15-18), which derives its emotive force from the refined rhythm of contrasting movements and lights, underlines the painter`s faithfulness to the Mannerist aesthetic he learned during his youth in Italy and France.The compositional structure
This painting was listed in the Museum`s inventories and catalogues as an anonymous work by the Dutch school, although in the 1889 catalogue it was noted that Bredius had suggested it should be attributed to Aert Anthonisz (1580-1620).On stylistic grounds the scene could be considered comparable with the output of Claes Claesz. Wou during the last stage in his career, by which time the rigid Manne
Samson freed himself from his chains and killed a thousand Philistines, enemies of the Israelites, using only the jawbone of an ass (Judges 15:15). Giulio Cesare was the son of the painter Ercole Procaccini and was first trained as a sculptor in Milan. This painting dates from his last period. The frame, which is modern, reproduces a Lombard seventeenth-century model.
An elaborate garland of flowers, fruit and animals frames a painting representing the Virgin Mary with the Christ Chile on her right arm and a crown of flowers in her left hand. Paintings of the Virgin framed with garlands were prized in the Flemish world, where they served as a response to the Protestant Reform that negated the validity of representations of the Virgin or of saints. Brueghel resp
The date of this painting has been the subject of critical debate for over a century. The 1889 edition of the Prado catalogue states that it was signed but fails to mention a date. The 1910 version describes it as being signed and dated in 1620. The question is not addressed in subsequent publications until that of 1985, which refers to it as being signed and dated in 1630, the year that is again
This is an extraordinary example of the eventful life of many royal portraits during the Siglo de Oro, and it shows just how much those paintings, rather than immutable artworks, were objects with a representative function and could thus be altered depending on the use they were assigned at any given time. The present bust portrait depicts King Philp IV (1605-1665) in the mid 1620s, when he was ju
The daughter of Henri IV of France and Marie de Médicis, Isabel de Borbón (1603-1644) was the first wife of Philip IV and the mother of Prince Baltasar Carlos and María Teresa of Austria. In Villandrando’s portrait, painted a year before Isabel became Queen of Spain, she wears a stiff, sumptuous dress that emphasises her presence and royal status. Although Spanish in cut, the
The blind man appears in profile playing his hurdy-gurdy, a stringed instrument with which he earns his living. Despite his miserable state, La Tour depicts him with considerable dignity, dressed in a cape that hides a chestnut vest and salmon-colored trousers. His face shows the mark of time, with tanned skin, deep wrinkles and an unkempt beard. His strong hands seem out of place for a musician b
Alberto de Austria, the sovereign prince of the Low Countries, is dressed in black and sits under a canopy indicating that this is a court portrait. Unlike the customary indoor portraits, this one is set on a balcony open to a landscape that includes Tervuren Palace, near Brussels. This portrait, and that of his wife, Isabel Clara (P01684), seeks not only to bring out the figure of the Archduke, b
