A highly
original Spanish artist, Francisco de Zurbarán, until recently was
not known beyond Spain. His works are rarely met in European museums and
are highly appreciated by collectors.
He was born in Fuente de Cantos (Estremadura) into the family of a petty
merchant. His professional training he received in Seville in 1616/17 in
the workshop of Pedro Diaz da Villanueva. Then he settled near his birthplace
to paint a large number of religious pictures for the monasteries and churches.
In Seville, where he settled in 1629, he became the leading artist. There
he produced many altarpieces and decorated a number of monasteries with
extensive fresco style cycles. In 1630-1645, Zurbarán executed a
lot of paintings of different saints; they are evidence of his talent as
a portraitist. They are usually separate figures in full height, with a
dark or neutral background. These paintings were used for decoration of
the churches and were hung on both sides of a central painting or altar.
Zurbarán executed a series of such paintings for churches and also
for the Hospital de la Sangre in Seville.
His style, with massively simple figures and objects, clear, sober colors
and deep solemnity of feeling expressed in thickly applied paint, made
him the ideal painter of the austere religion of Spain.
His fortunes fell with Murillo’s
rise. In 1658 he moved to Madrid, where he entered the Santiago Order.
In order to support himself he had to become an art dealer, though he was
not successful in business either. He died in Madrid in 1664 in poverty.
Note
The Defense of Cádiz
Against the English represents the events of November 1, 1625, when
Lord Wimbledon disembarked in the outskirts of Cádiz with 8,000
men. The governor of the city, Don Fernando Girón y Ponce de León,
directed the defense from an armchair because of his gout. Nevertheless
he put the enemy to flight with only six hundred men.
See: Francisco de Zurbarán. The
Defense of Cadiz Against the English.
Bibliography: Painting of Europe. XIII-XX centuries. Encyclopedic Dictionary.
Moscow. Iskusstvo. 1999.
Zurbaran
by Jeannine Baticle. Harry N Abrams, 1988.
Masters
of Art: Zurbaran by Jonathan Brown. Harry N Abrams, 1991.
Zurbarán
by Arsenio Moren. Gallimard, 1999.
