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Saint Apollonia was one of the virgins martyred in Alexandria (Egypt) in the third century, A.D. during the religious persecution of Christians. In this small plate on copper, the Bolognese painter captures the moment when two henchmen torture the saint, who is tied to a post, by extracting her teeth with large pliers. That explains why this tool (sometimes including teeth) is her customary attrib
A member of a dynasty of artists that began with his grandfather, the sculptor Pablo González Velázquez (1664-1727), Zacarías González Velázquez initially trained with his father, the painter Antonio González Velázquez (1723-94). In 1777, he joined the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando, an institution to which he remained tied for the rest
This is a preparatory oil sketch for the decoration of a section of the dome in the monastery church of Santa Engracia, Zaragoza. An early work by the artist, it is close to the style of Antonio González Velázquez (1723-1794). Bayeu makes use of a complex palette and dark tonalities with a preference for browns and greyish-red shades that looks back to Spanish Golden Age painting.
The Apostles sleep in the foreground, indifferent to the suffering of Christ who is attended by angels. One holds a chalice, prefiguring the Passion. The artist looked to Correggio (c. 1489-1534) in the treatment of the figures and folds of the drapery, which have details characteristic of a miniature. The canvas was in the Roman collection of the painter Carlo Maratta (1625-1713) and was acquired
The subject of the angelic consolation of Saint Francis became popular in the second half of the sixteenth century as a result of the Catholic Church´s renewed appreciation of his mystical experiences, almost to the exclusion of the more picturesque episodes of the saint´s life that had characterised traditional iconography; for example, his encounter with the wolf of Gubbio, and the invention of
Maratti was a pupil of Sacchi (ca. 1599-1661). He may have painted this portrait as a pair to that of Francesco Albani by Sacchi (also on display in this room), which he acquired in 1661. It passed from Maratti’s collection to that of Philip V in 1722 and was in the palace of La Granja one year later. It entered the Prado in 1849.
The significance of this landscape remains obscure. It depicts two figures in the foreground, one pointing to a winding path flanked by funerary monuments and leading to a group of temples or a necropolis. The painting was in the collection of the painter Carlo Maratta.
Between 1635 and 1636 Sacchi left Bologna in order to study the work of Correggio (c. 1489-1534) and the Venetian painters. Before leaving he painted a portrait of his teacher, Albani (1578-1660), aged fifty-six, and kept this image until his death. It was acquired by his pupil Carlo Maratti (1625-1713), from whose collection it passed to that of Philip V after Maratti’s death.
Domenico Zampieri, called Domenichino, a Bolognese, painted this arch in celebration of Saint John the Baptist in Rome, and through it acknowledged his friend and protector Giovanni Battista Agucchi, a great theorist of Roman classicism. The emblems and biblical passages on the architecture allude to virtues associated with the saint. The painting comes from the collection of the painter Carlo Mar
A panorama whose exquisitely contrasting colors -in the sky and in the dark green trees- reflect a prodigious mastery of light drawn from knowledge of Venetian techniques and Bolognese aesthetic concepts influenced, in turn, by Domenichino’s work in this field. The canvas expresses the spectacular monumentality of a landscape that contrasts the straightforward aspects of everyday rural life on the
The sitter is the First Count Colomera (1723-1819), a distinguished soldier who served in the Spanish army during various successive reigns. The canvas uses numerous devices typical of Baroque descriptive portraiture although dating from a period when that style was in decline. The sitter is dressed as a minister with the sash of the rank of Captain General and the grand cross of the Order of Char
Figura desnuda en fondo de paisaje. El paisaje es obra de Dughet y la figura de Carlo Maratti.
This is an extremely spontaneous and lively preparatory study for a now lost, larger painting. Seated in an imaginary room in a palace are Philip V and his second wife Isabella Farnese. Around them are their sons, the future monarchs Louis I, Ferdinand VI and Charles III, and Philip, Duke of Parma. In an oval frame is the official portrait, sent from Paris, of María Ana Victoria, betrothed
This allegorical work, signed on the column lying on the ground in the centre of the composition, shows two women in Roman garb sitting on clouds. Representing Justice and Peace, they embrace and seem about to kiss each other. This pictorial motif could be used to express political peace or, as is the case here, to allude to the peaceful policies that characterised the reign of Ferdinand VI, for w
This is an official portrait of Felipe V (1683-1746), the first Bourbon king of Spain. The grandson of Louis XIV (1638-1715) of France, he was born in Versailles and was proclaimed King of Spain in 1700. Married two times, he had numerous children and died in Madrid in 1746. The king wears armor and carries a ruler´s staff. A warrior´s helmet rests on a stone in front of him. Along with the sumptu
