MORALES, Luis de

The artist was inspired by a painting of the same subject by Sebastiano del Piombo.

Luis de Morales (called El Divino), was a distinctly original personality. The distinctive features of his style - a painstaking technique inherited from the Flemish masters, and elongated forms that foreshadow the art of EI Greco - are especially evident in the works of his final period. Morales painted numerous versions of the Virgin and Child, sometimes with the infant St.John, and touching visions inspired by the theme “Ecce Homo,” which are among his most popular works. Sensitivity to content and concentration on the sacred drama are the chief characteristics of this typical representative of Spanish asceticism.

We know very little about Morales. He appears never to have left Spain, and the influence of Italian Mannerism reached him only through the work of Pedro de Campana, an artist of Flemish origin. Virgin and Child is one of his most characteristic pictures, and there are several variants. The composition of the painting may possibly be traced to an engraving by D�rer, but the influence of Italian Mannerism is very strongly felt in the delicate elongation of the neck, the tapering of the fingers, the Leonardo-like softness of the features, the sweet expression reminiscent of Raphael and the use of large blocks of strong colour for the garments. And even if most of Morales’s painting does not rise above the average standard achieved by his contemporaries, the variants of Virgin and Child demonstrate an engaging and pleasant handling which justifies the attribute so generally conferred upon him: El Divino, the ‘Divine’ Morales.

Nothing is known about the life of the painter. The Madonna with the Child was his favourite subject which he painted in several versions. He was very popular and received the nickname “El Divino”. The influence of Italian Mannerism is clearly seen on his paintings, it is supposed that it arrived to the painter through Pedro de Campana, a painter of Flemish origin.

The solitary figure of the mourning Virgin personifies the Church, left alone to bear the sorrows of the world after the disciples have fled. It is called the Virgin of Pity. The theme was especially attractive to Spanish painters of the Counter-Reformation where it is called La Soledad, the Virgin of Solitude.

Most of Morales’s clientele preferred simplified compositions comprising a few figures, dramatically illuminated and posed against a dark or neutral background, the purpose of which was to arouse feelings of tragedy in the viewers and even move them to tears. This Pietà, which came from the Jesuit church in C�rdoba, is an example of this type of compositions.

Luis de Morales was especially fond of the theme of the Pietà, in which he expressed the pathos of Christ’s suffering and His Mother’s grief as she holds the body of her dead son. On this occasion the artist focuses his attention on the composition, the central axis of which is the stake on which Christ was crucified. By presenting only the upper part of the Fifth Anguish, avoiding the whole of Christ’s body in His Mother’s lap, Morales stresses the emotional charge of the scene.

Luis de Morales (called El Divino) was a distinctly original personality. The distinctive features of his style - a painstaking technique inherited from the Flemish masters, and elongated forms that foreshadow the art of El Greco - are especially evident in the works of his final period. Morales painted numerous versions of the Virgin and Child, sometimes with the infant St John, and touching visions inspired by the theme “Ecce Homo”, which are among his most popular works. Sensitivity to content and concentration on the sacred drama are the chief characteristics of this typical representative of Spanish asceticism.

This panel is an example of the artist’s representation of La Virgen del Sombrero, or La Virgen de la Gitana, an iconography associated with the circular gipsy hat worn by the Virgin, signaling her humble origins. The compositional type recalls the works of Raphael and the sfumato modelling reveals the enduring influence of the work of Leonardo and his followers on Morales’s work.

This painting is typically Spanish for its fervent pietism. The Infant is shown holding a spindle, referring to his attire at birth and at death, the miraculously expanding garment woven by his mother that lasted a short lifetime. The depth of emotion of the image is often found in Spanish religious art of later times.

This is an unusual depiction of the Virgin and Child by Morales, particularly so in its inclusion of the young St John the Baptist in the background. St. John’s presence adds a narrative element to a scene that, for the most part, Morales almost always confines to a simple interaction between mother and child. Here however, creeping into view from behind, we see St John making direct eye contact with us, cheekily imploring us to remain quiet for fear of awakening his young cousin who sleeps cradled against his mother’s bosom. His inclusion turns the painting from one of, and for, mere devotion into something familial; it adds a sense of domesticity and informality to an otherwise purely devotional depiction of the Virgin and Child.

Morales created highly esteemed prototypes of the Madonna and Child with Mannerist touches.