Paintings such as this one by the prominent Sevillian artist Valdés Leal were heavily influenced by the Spanish tradition of large-scale, theatrical sculptures, particularly the pasos—carved and painted ensembles of religious figures typically in intense states of emotion that were paraded through the streets before Easter Sunday. The gruesome details of Christ’s suffering, an especially Spanish phenomenon in painting and sculpture, were intended to heighten spiritual fervor.
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Fig. 1. Painting in frame: overall
Fig. 2. Painting in frame: corner
Fig. 3. Painting in frame: angled corner
Artwork Details
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Title:Pietà
Artist:Juan de Valdés Leal (Spanish, Seville 1622–1690 Seville)
Date:ca. 1657–60
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:63 1/4 x 56 1/2 in. (160.7 x 143.5 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Victor Wilbour Memorial Fund, 1954
Object Number:54.168
[M. Payen, Paris]; [Ryaux, Paris, until 1954; as by Carreno de Miranda; sold for $800 to Kleinberger]; [Kleinberger, New York, 1954; sold to The Met]
Seville. Museo de Bellas Artes de Sevilla. "Valdés Leal," February 28–March 30, 1991, no. 34.
Madrid. Museo Nacional del Prado. "Valdés Leal," April 25–June 30, 1991, no. 34.
Mexico City. Centro Cultural Arte Contemporáneo. "Juan de Valdés Leal y el arte sevillano del barroco," August 5–December 5, 1993, no. 26.
Harold E. Wethey. Letter to Margaretta Salinger. February 18 and October 25, 1955, believes it is probably by Valdés Leal.
Juan Antonio Gaya Nuño. La pintura española fuera de España. Madrid, 1958, p. 130, no. 542, as by Carreño de Miranda.
Martin Soria in George Kubler and Martin Soria. Art and Architecture in Spain and Portugal and their American Dominions, 1500 to 1800. Baltimore, 1959, pp. 293, pl. 161A, ascribes it to Valdés Leal and dates it about 1657–60.
Harold E. Wethey. "Book Reviews: Art and Architecture in Spain and Portugal and their American Dominions, 1500–1800. By George Kubler and Martin Soria, 1959." The Americas 16 (April 1960), p. 426, concurs with Soria's attribution of the painting to Valdés Leal.
Duncan T. Kinkead. Letter to Marcus Burke. May 20, 1975, attributes it to Valdés Leal; dates it about 1658.
Duncan Theobald Kinkead. "Juan de Valdés Leal (1622–1690): His Life and Work." PhD diss., University of Michigan, 1976, pp. 125–26, 383–84, no. 65, fig. 61, dates it about 1658.
Enrique Valdivieso. Historia de la pintura sevillana: Siglos XIII al XX. Seville, 1986, p. 268.
Enrique Valdivieso. Juan de Valdés Leal. Seville, 1988, pp. 95–98, 240, no. 65, colorpl. 69, dates it about 1657–59.
Domingo Sánchez-Mesa Martín. Historia del arte en Andalucia. Vol. 7, El arte del Barroco: Escultura, pintura y artes decorativas. Seville, 1991, p. 414.
Enrique Valdivieso. Valdés Leal. Ed. José Sánchez Dubé. Exh. cat., Museo de Bellas Artes de Sevilla. [Madrid], [1991], pp. 144–45, no. 34, ill. (color).
Enrique Pareja López inJuan de Valdés Leal y el arte sevillano del Barroco. Exh. cat., Centro Cultural Arte Contemporáneo. Mexico, 1993, pp. 220–21, no. 26, ill. (color), dates it about 1657–59.
Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 161, ill.
The frame is from Florence and dates to about 1860 (see figs. 1–3 above). This reverse profile frame is made of pine and both water gilded and painted a blue green. The cavetta hollow sight edge rises to a carved laurel leaf top edge which falls back in a painted hollow to a simple gilded bead at the back edge. Skillfully replicated carved corners and centers based on seventeenth-century models in the form of volute clasps with rocaille spines are flanked by leafy caliculi. The surface was regilded no doubt when the height of the frame was increased.
Timothy Newbery with Cynthia Moyer 2015; further information on this frame can be found in the Department of European Paintings files
Velázquez (Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez) (Spanish, Seville 1599–1660 Madrid)
1650
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