DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.48088#0629
MURILLO.
Spanish art in the seventeenth century is essentially founded on portrait-painting.
Naturalistic conception forced its way everywhere into the ecclesiastical pictures, and very rare
are those works of Spanish art which strive after reality by withdrawing from nature what is
merely accidental. The conception of the natural, meanwhile, gives to the paintings of the
Spaniards an extraordinary vital energy, and endows their figures with a faculty which is con-
vincing, of action, feeling, and endurance. This pathos has received a broad and solid foundation.
The paintings of all the great artists of Spain are seldom indeed grand or severe in style, but
if formal perfection be wanting there is seldom anything to be wished for in powerful and lofty
feeling. The Spaniard succeeds especially in the representation of devout fervour and religious
ecstasy.
The greatest painter of the so-called “school” of Seville, Bartolomeo Esteban Murillo, born
1618, united in himself all the excellencies of his immediate predecessors and contemporaries.
With very scanty, previous study, he was early obliged to gain a livelihood by his brush.
He painted heads of saints, portraits, and, while still a mere youth, produced those famous street
figures of Seville, which, even as a master, he took a particular pleasure in painting. It was
but for a short time that he followed the Italian naturalistic painters, of whom Spagnuoletto
excited great attention in Spain. Murillo was attracted, on the other hand, by the manner of
Velasquez and endeavoured to adopt his power and colouring. When the very able master
Pedro de Moya returned home from the Netherlands and developed in his pictures the liquid
colouring of a Rubens and the fine artistic arrangement of Vandyke, Murillo devoted much
study to the foreign masters, and in many of his pictures their influence is very plainly to be
recognised.
When Murillo had arrived, however, at his full vigour, he laid aside this imitation, and from
this time onwards, was only himself. The perfection of style and form he was never able to
master, never perhaps wished it very distinctly. He is just as littie as Vandyke, a master of
the dramatic, but possesses, on the other hand, the power of giving the liveliest expression to
feeling. He never fails to exhibit effectually the intellectual life of his figures, and although
.disturbing, even ugly elements may slip in, still Murillo attains to an often sublime flight of
feeling.
With Murillo the colouring is of great importance. This, as well as the prevailing effect of
light, always possesses something extremely characteristic, and intensifies not only the impression
Spanish art in the seventeenth century is essentially founded on portrait-painting.
Naturalistic conception forced its way everywhere into the ecclesiastical pictures, and very rare
are those works of Spanish art which strive after reality by withdrawing from nature what is
merely accidental. The conception of the natural, meanwhile, gives to the paintings of the
Spaniards an extraordinary vital energy, and endows their figures with a faculty which is con-
vincing, of action, feeling, and endurance. This pathos has received a broad and solid foundation.
The paintings of all the great artists of Spain are seldom indeed grand or severe in style, but
if formal perfection be wanting there is seldom anything to be wished for in powerful and lofty
feeling. The Spaniard succeeds especially in the representation of devout fervour and religious
ecstasy.
The greatest painter of the so-called “school” of Seville, Bartolomeo Esteban Murillo, born
1618, united in himself all the excellencies of his immediate predecessors and contemporaries.
With very scanty, previous study, he was early obliged to gain a livelihood by his brush.
He painted heads of saints, portraits, and, while still a mere youth, produced those famous street
figures of Seville, which, even as a master, he took a particular pleasure in painting. It was
but for a short time that he followed the Italian naturalistic painters, of whom Spagnuoletto
excited great attention in Spain. Murillo was attracted, on the other hand, by the manner of
Velasquez and endeavoured to adopt his power and colouring. When the very able master
Pedro de Moya returned home from the Netherlands and developed in his pictures the liquid
colouring of a Rubens and the fine artistic arrangement of Vandyke, Murillo devoted much
study to the foreign masters, and in many of his pictures their influence is very plainly to be
recognised.
When Murillo had arrived, however, at his full vigour, he laid aside this imitation, and from
this time onwards, was only himself. The perfection of style and form he was never able to
master, never perhaps wished it very distinctly. He is just as littie as Vandyke, a master of
the dramatic, but possesses, on the other hand, the power of giving the liveliest expression to
feeling. He never fails to exhibit effectually the intellectual life of his figures, and although
.disturbing, even ugly elements may slip in, still Murillo attains to an often sublime flight of
feeling.
With Murillo the colouring is of great importance. This, as well as the prevailing effect of
light, always possesses something extremely characteristic, and intensifies not only the impression