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This is one of the few winter scenes painted by Hendrick Dubbels still preserved today. In the Museum`s catalogues it is described as a scene with skaters, although only three of the many characters depicted here are actually skating, and one is putting on skates. The 1873 and 1878 editions state that, despite the signature, some consider this to be by Bonaventura Peeters; the 1885 publication men
Jerónimo Vich y Valterra (1459-1535) was Spain’s ambassador to Rome between 1506 and 1521, under the reigns of Ferdinand the Catholic and Charles V. Vich commissioned Sebastiano del Piombo to paint a triptych whose central panel with the Lamentation over the Body of Christ is now at the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg. One of its sides bears Christ’s Descent into Limbo and is also at t
The Virgin Mary is presented as a little girl with her hands crossed over her chest. Wearing blue and white, she ascends on a group of angels’ heads as the heavens open to welcome her. This differs from earlier versions of the same subject by Zurbarán in its lack of symbols of the litanies and in the presence of a group of singing angels that occupy the entire bottom of the painting and are
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.
Michel-Ange Houasse, son of the painter René-Antoine Houasse (c.1645-1710), had enjoyed a long career during the reign of Louis XIV of France (r.1643-1715). From 1715 until his death, Michel-Ange worked in the court in Madrid during the reign of the first Bourbon monarch, Philip V (r.1700-24 and 1724-46), creating interesting landscape paintings, genre scenes, religious paintings and portra
Like many other works by Andrea di Lione, Jacob’s journey, c.1635-65, was previously attributed to Genoese painter Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione (Il Grechetto). It is one of the most successful landscapes with figures by Lione, who first studied with battle painter Aniello Falcone (1607-1656) and later developed a more bucolic manner under the influence of Castiglione, whom he lived alongside in
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.
Venus, the Roman goddess of Love and Beauty, is accidentally wounded by one of her son Cupid´s arrows, which triggers her passion for Adonis. This love story ends with the tragic death of the hero. The scene is based on book X of Ovid´s Metamorphoses, one of the most important sources of mythology for artists of that time. The composition and pictorial technique in this work are a fine
This painting has particular documentary interest as it shows the inside of Saint Peter’s transept and chancel before work began on Bernini’s Throne of Saint Peter (1656). The small figures that enliven the canvas are painted with the light and vibrant bambocciantes technique. This is one of this artist’s few known works.
Today, Juan Carreño, who was appointed Chamber Painter to the King in 1671, is best remembered for his portraits from the court of Charles II, but, in fact, most of his paintings are devotional. Such works abounded at churches, convents, and private homes in Madrid and its surroundings, and they contributed to the artist´s growing renown. Chief among them is the artist´s Saint Sebastian. Ac
Large series of paintings for religious orders were painted throughout the seventeenth century. They include free-standing figures of saints and scenes with more complex compositions. That is the case of the present work, which belongs to a series of saints made around 1657 by Valdés Leal for the Sacristy of the Convent of San Jerónimo in Seville. The series was scattered in the nine
Depictions of painting galleries became popular in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 17th century. The exhibition of paintings and other artistic or natural objects was originally a way of manifesting the high social standing of an eminently bourgeois class with a strong desire to ennoble itself. In many cases, the paintings did not rigorously reflect the client’s collection, but served inst
This is the type of river landscape in which Schoeff specialised. In its compositional arrangement and diverse elements -tree, windmill, fishing boats- it closely resembles the river landscapes painted by Jan van Goyen (1596-1656) in the 1630s, or those produced by Salomon van Ruysdael (1600/02-1670) from the 1640s onwards.The composition is neither detailed nor anecdotal, since its aim is to capt
Espinosa was the leading painter working in Valencia in the mid-seventeenth century. He deployed a naturalistic style characterised by precise description and a selective use of light. Most of his works depict religious themes, including the present canvas with its unusual subject matter. The compositional rigour and monumental character make this canvas particularly outstanding within Espinosa’s
This scene depicts one of the central episodes in the childhood of Christ, when he entered into a theological dispute with the learned men in the temple in Jerusalem. To represent the building the artist employed an architectural language familiar to any contemporary Sevilian, reminding us that gesso decoration reached one of its peaks in Andalusian churches in the mid-17th century. Adquirido
This painting has recently been identified as a work by Pietro Novelli, known as Il Monrealese on account of his having been born in Monreale, Sicily. It was considered until 1933 to be the work of Neapolitan painter Andrea Vaccaro, and after that time its authorship was demoted to Anonymous Neapolitan by the Museo del Prado. The painting passed largely unnoticed on account of its being on long-te
Bishop Gennaro (or Januarius) is the patron saint of Naples, and thus the subject of numerous works from that city’s rich school of painting. According to tradition, he was bishop of Benevento during the Diocletianic Persecution in the third century AD. While visiting Pozzuoli, north of the Gulf of Naples, Gennaro was taken prisoner and tortured in various ways, miraculously emerging unscathed. Fi
Guido Reni`s painting shows a young Cupid facing the viewer, with the seashore behind him, his left leg bent and left foot resting on a slab of stone. Cupid raises his left hand to a dove and with his right hand holds his bow. The loosened bowstring indicates that he has been disarmed; his remaining arrows lie in a quiver discarded on the ground. The subject appears to be a variation of Love tamed
