Circle of Diego Velázquez, Formerly Attributed to Juan de Pareja

Art market, Madrid;

Where acquired by Henry Wellesley (1773-1847), 1^st Baron Cowley, by 1836 (as Velázquez);

Sir John Charles Robinson (1824-1913);

From whom acquired by Sir Francis Cook (1817-1901), 1st Baronet and 1st Viscount of Monserrate, 1892, Doughty House, Richmond (as Velázquez);

Thence by descent to his grandson, Sir Herbert Frederick Cook (1868-1939), 3rd Baronet, Organ Room, Doughty House, Richmond (inv. no. 503, as Attributed to Velázquez);

Thence by descent to Sir Francis Ferdinand Maurice Cook (1907-1978), 4th Baronet, Doughty House, Richmond;

From whom acquired by Thomas Agnew's & Sons, London (inv. no. 20352) and M.H. Drey, London (inv. no. J2040), 1957 (as Attributed to Juan de Pareja);

From whom acquired by Robert C. Vose Galleries, Boston (inv. no. 20039, as Juan de Pareja), 1960;

From whom acquired by the High Museum of Art, Atlanta (inv. no. 60.21, as Attributed to Juan de Pareja), 1960;

By whom deaccessioned ("Property from the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Sold to Benefit the Acquisitions Fund"), New York, Christie's, 17 June 2004, lot 66 (as Follower of Velázquez);

With Salander O'Reilly Galleries, New York (inv. no. 24557, as Velázquez);

Thereafter acquired by the present collector.

British Institution for the Promoting the Fine Arts in the United Kingdom, exhibition catalogue, London 1836, p. 12, cat. no. 112 (as Velázquez);

C.B. Curtis, Velazquez and Murillo, London 1883, p. 89, cat. no. 229dd (as Velázquez);

Exhibition of Spanish Art, exhibition catalogue, London 1895, p. 32, cat. no. 130 (as Velázquez);

W. Armstrong, The Art of Velázquez, A Study of his Life and Art, London 1896, p. 9, reproduced (as Velázquez);

C. Phillips, in Daily Telegraph, 14 January 1896 (as not by Velázquez);

A.G. Temple, Catalogue of the Exhibition of the Works of Spanish Painters, exhibition catalogue, London 1901, p. 103, cat. no. 108 (as Velázquez);

R.A.M. Stevenson, Velásquez, London 1912, p. 135 (as Velázquez);

H. Cook, in A Catalogue of the Paintings at Doughty House, Richmond, and Elsewhere in the Collection of Sir Frederick Cook, Bt, Visconde de Monserrate, Herbert Cook (ed.), vol. III, London 1915, p. 142, cat. no. 503, reproduced (as Attributed to Velázquez);

M.W. Brockwell, Abridged Catalogue of the Pictures at Doughty House, Richmond, Surrey, in the Collection of Sir Herbert Cook, London 1932, p. 58, cat. no. 503 (as Attributed to Velázquez);

A.L. Mayer, Velázquez, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Pictures and Drawings, London 1936, p. 43, cat. no. 178, reproduced pl. 72 (as "school copy" of lost original);

C. Peman, "Sobre Autorretratos de Juventud de Velázquez," in Varia Velázquena, Madrid 1960, vol. I, pp. 696-697, 701 (as a replica or later variant);

Velázquez y lo velazqueño, Catalogo de la exposición homenaje a Diego de Silva Velázquez en el III centenario de su muerte (1660-1960), exhibition catalogue, Madrid 1960, p. 70, under cat. no. 66 (as copy after Velázquez);

El Greco to Goya, A Loan Exhibition of Spanish Painting of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, exhibition catalogue, Indianapolis 1963, n.p., cat. no. 59, reproduced (as Attributed to Pareja);

J. López-Rey, Velázquez, A Catalogue Raisonné of his Oeuvre, London 1963, p. 184, cat. no 183, reproduced pl. 230 (as School of Velázquez);

P.M. Bardi, L'opera completa di Velázquez, Milan 1969, p. 100, cat. no. 82c (as Velázquez);

D. Pullins, in Juan de Pareja, Afro-Hispanic Painter in the Age of Velázquez, exhibition catalogue, D. Pullins and V.K. Valdés (eds.), New York 2023, p. 142, cat. no. 19, reproduced (under Juan de Pareja, Possible Attributions).

London, British Institution, May 1836, no. 112 (lent by Lord Cowley);

London, The New Gallery, Exhibition of Spanish Art, 1895 - 1896, no. 140 (lent by Sir Francis Cook);

London, Guildhall, Exhibition of the Works of Spanish Painters, 1901, no. 108 (lend by the executors of the late Sir Francis Cook);

Madrid, Biosca Gallery, Exposición de Arte Antiguo (Pintura), 20 October - 5 November 1947 (as Velázquez);

Indianapolis, John Herron Museum of Art; Providence, Rhode Island School of Design, El Greco to Goya, A Loan Exhibition of Spanish Painting of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, 10 February - 26 May 1963, no. 59 (lent by Atlanta Art Association Galleries).

This bust-length portrait of Diego Velázquez depicts the celebrated artist wearing a black doublet, over which hangs the red cross of the Order of Santiago (conferred on the painter in 1658). The work relates closely to two of Velázquez's self-portraits: one in the Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, and another (cut-down and damaged) in the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Carlo, Valencia. The authorship of the present painting remains elusive: although attributed to Velázquez himself at various points in its history, the portrait was almost certainly executed by a talented member of his circle.

Apart from Velázquez himself, the only other name that has been associated with the present work is that of Juan de Pareja (circa 1608-1670), the Afro-Hispanic painter enslaved by Velázquez for close to twenty years and manumitted in 1654.¹ Despite being the subject of a recent exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Juan de Pareja: Afro-Hispanic Painter in the Age of Velázquez , Pareja’s career and corpus remain difficult to understand in all of their complexities.² However, Pareja, much like Juan Bautista Martinez del Mazo, is known to have produced replicas of Velázquez's compositions.³ Additionally (as was not unusual) Pareja did on occasion paint on reused canvases, as recent infrared reflectography has revealed was the case here.⁴

The portrait’s impressive provenance, unbroken from 1826 until 2004, can be traced to the early nineteenth century, when it was acquired in Madrid by Henry Wellesley, the 1^st Lord Cowley, who served as the British Ambassador to Spain during the Peninsular War. He must have returned with the work to London by 1836, when it was included in the British Institution’s May exhibition. Sometime thereafter it passed into the collection of painter and art curator, Sir John Charles Robinson, who in 1892 sold the work to Sir Francis Cook, who Robinson frequently advised on acquisitions. The portrait remained in the esteemed Cook collection for four generations until, by 1960, it was acquired by the Atlanta Art Association (today’s High Museum of Art).

¹ Velázquez granted Pareja his freedom in 1650, to go into effect four years later. See J. Montagu, "Velázquez Marginalia: His Slave Juan de Pareja and His Illegitimate Son Antonio," in Burlington Magazine 125, no. 968 (November 1983), p. 684.

The painting’s verso reveals the complex vicissitudes of the work’s attribution: the attributions to Juan de Pareja on two labels (one from Boston’s Vose Galleries and another that remains, as yet, unidentified) were subsequently crossed out.  

² 3 April – 16 July 2023.

³ See, for instance, Pullins 2003, pp. 112-114, cat. nos. 1, 2.

⁴ As is the case with Portrait of a Benedictine Monk (Saint Petersburg, State Hermitage Museum, inv. no. 366). IRR imaging available upon request.