Saint John the Baptist | |
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Artist | El Greco |
Year | 1597–1607 |
Medium | oil on canvas |
Dimensions | 111 cm× 66 cm(44 in× 26 in) |
Location | Legion of Honor Museum, San Francisco |
Saint John the Baptist is an oil on canvas painting executed between 1597 and 1607 by the Greek artist El Greco whilst living in Spain. It is in the collection of the Legion of Honor museum, a component part of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. [1]
The painting depicts a young Saint John, dressed in animal skins, holding a long staff with a cross-shaped top. Beside him sleeps a lamb on a rock, representing the "Agnus Dei" (Lamb of God i.e. Jesus Christ), whose coming he prophesied. The work is autographed in cursive Greek script on a rock to his left. The clouds about his head resemble a halo. In the distance can be made out the monastery of El Escorial.
The work was once held by the Convento de San José in Malagón, Ciudad Real before passing via several private collections to the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, part of the San Francisco Museum of Fine Arts, in 1946. The Young collection was transferred in 1972 to the Legion of Honor.
Another version of the painting (see left), differing in that some of the nearby rocks and distant background are absent, exists in the collection of the Museu de Belles Arts de València, Valencia, Spain.
Domḗnikos Theotokópoulos, most widely known as El Greco, was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. El Greco was a nickname, and the artist normally signed his paintings with his full birth name in Greek letters, often adding the word Κρής, which means "Cretan".
The Prado Museum, officially known as Museo Nacional del Prado, is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It is widely considered to house one of the world's finest collections of European art, dating from the 12th century to the early 20th century, based on the former Spanish royal collection, and the single best collection of Spanish art. Founded as a museum of paintings and sculpture in 1819, it also contains important collections of other types of works. The Prado Museum is one of the most visited sites in the world and is considered one of the greatest art museums in the world. The numerous works by Francisco Goya, the single most extensively represented artist, as well as by Hieronymus Bosch, El Greco, Peter Paul Rubens, Titian, and Diego Velázquez, are some of the highlights of the collection. Velázquez and his keen eye and sensibility were also responsible for bringing much of the museum's fine collection of Italian masters to Spain, now one of the largest outside Italy.
The Legion of Honor, formally known as the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, is an art museum in San Francisco, California. Located in Lincoln Park, the Legion of Honor is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, which also administers the de Young Museum.
San Juan Bautista is the Spanish-language name of Saint John the Baptist. It may refer to:
Simon Vouet was a French painter who studied and rose to prominence in Italy before being summoned by Louis XIII to serve as Premier peintre du Roi in France. He and his studio of artists created religious and mythological paintings, portraits, frescoes, tapestries, and massive decorative schemes for the king and for wealthy patrons, including Richelieu. During this time, "Vouet was indisputably the leading artist in Paris," and was immensely influential in introducing the Italian Baroque style of painting to France. He was also according to Pierre Rosenberg, "without doubt one of the outstanding seventeenth-century draughtsmen, equal to Annibale Carracci and Lanfranco."
Jusepe de Ribera was a Spanish painter and printmaker who, along with Francisco de Zurbarán, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, and the singular Diego Velázquez, is regarded as one of the major artists of Spanish Baroque painting. Referring to a series of Ribera exhibitions held in the late 20th century, Philippe de Montebello wrote "If Ribera's status as the undisputed protagonist of Neapolitan painting had ever been in doubt, it was no longer. Indeed, to many it seemed that Ribera emerged from these exhibitions as not simply the greatest Neapolitan artist of his age but one of the outstanding European masters of the seventeenth century." Jusepe de Ribera has also been referred to as José de Ribera, Josep de Ribera, and Lo Spagnoletto by his contemporaries, early historians, and biographers.
Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida was a Spanish Valencian painter. Sorolla excelled in the painting of portraits, landscapes and monumental works of social and historical themes. His most typical works are characterized by a dexterous representation of the people and landscape under the bright sunlight of Spain and sunlit water.
José Benlliure y Gil was a Spanish painter.
The de Young Museum, formally the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, is a fine arts museum located in San Francisco, California. Located in Golden Gate Park, it is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, along with the Legion of Honor. The de Young is named for early San Francisco newspaperman M. H. de Young.
The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF), comprising the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park and the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park, is the largest public arts institution in the city of San Francisco. FAMSF’s combined attendance was 1,158,264 visitors in 2022, making it the fifth most attended art institution in the United States.
Taddeo di Bartolo, also known as Taddeo Bartoli, was an Italian painter of the Sienese School during the early Renaissance. He is among the artists profiled in Vasari's biographies of artists or Vite. Vasari claims he is the uncle of Domenico di Bartolo.
The Burial of the Count of Orgaz is a 1586 painting by El Greco, a prominent Renaissance painter, sculptor, and architect of Greek origin. Widely considered among his finest works, it illustrates a popular local legend of his time. An exceptionally large painting, it is divided into two sections, heavenly above and terrestrial below, but it gives little impression of duality, since the upper and lower sections are brought together compositionally.
Cretan School describes an important school of icon painting, under the umbrella of post-Byzantine art, which flourished while Crete was under Venetian rule during the Late Middle Ages, reaching its climax after the Fall of Constantinople, becoming the central force in Greek painting during the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries. The Cretan artists developed a particular style of painting under the influence of both Eastern and Western artistic traditions and movements; the most famous product of the school, El Greco, was the most successful of the many artists who tried to build a career in Western Europe, and also the one who left the Byzantine style farthest behind him in his later career.
Bartolomé Bermejo was a Spanish painter who adopted Flemish painting techniques and conventions. Born in Cordoba, he is known for his work in the Crown of Aragon, including the Principality of Catalonia and the Kingdom of Valencia. His real name was Bartolomé de Cárdenas: the name Bermejo, which means auburn in Spanish, possibly relates to his hair colour. Bermejo may relate also to his name, Cardenas; Cardeno means purplish.
Jacopo del Sellaio (1441/42–1493), was an Italian painter of the early Renaissance, active in his native Florence. His real name was Jacopo di Arcangelo. He worked in an eclectic style based on those of Botticelli, Filippino Lippi, and Domenico Ghirlandaio. The nickname Sellaio derives from the profession of his father, a saddle maker.
The Museu de Belles Arts de València is an art gallery in Valencia, Spain, founded in 1913. It houses some 2,000 works, most dating from the 14th–17th centuries, including a Self portrait of Diego Velázquez, a St. John the Baptist by El Greco, Goya's Playing Children, Gonzalo Pérez's Altarpiece of Sts. Ursula, Martin and Antony and a Madonna with Writing Child and Bishop by the Italian Renaissance master Pinturicchio. It houses a large series of engravings by Giovan Battista Piranesi.
The Lázaro Galdiano Museum is a museum located in Madrid, Spain. It houses the art collection of José Lázaro Galdiano. The museum was inaugurated on 27 January 1951.
Saint Peter and Saint Paul is a painting by the Cretan-Spanish artist El Greco. The work was completed between 1590 and 1600. It is currently on display at the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, who purchased the work in 1932.
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Madonna and Child enthroned with St. John the Baptist and St. Augustine is an oil painting by Greek painter Ioannis Permeniates. He was from Crete living in Venice. He was active during the first part of the 16th century. There are dozens of works attributed to the artist. He is a cross-over artist who painted in both the maniera greca and the Venetian style. Other similar artists were El Greco and Michael Damaskinos. Ioannis Permeniates's work was influenced by Vittore Carpaccio and Giovanni Bellini. His most notable painting is the Madonna and Child enthroned with St. John the Baptist and St. Augustine. Many Italian artists painted the same subject matter. The most famous painting depicting the subjects is the Madonna and Child with St John the Baptist and St Augustine by Petrus Perusinus. The Permeniates is part of the collection Museo Correr in Venice, Italy.