LUIS DE MORALES AND WORKSHOP | Pietà

Dr. John E. Stillwell, New York, by 1927;
His sale, New York, Anderson Galleries, 1-3 December 1927, lot 480, to Harding for $2,200;
George F. Harding, Jr. (d. 1939), Chicago;
Bequeathed to the George F. Harding Museum, Chicago;
Ownership transferred to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1982;
Accessioned 1983 (George F. Harding Collection, acc.no. 1983.371).

San Diego, Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego, Old Master Spanish Paintings, 1933 (no catalogue);
Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of a Century of Progress, Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture Lent from American Museums, 1 June - 1 November 1933, no. 180;
Brooklyn, Brooklyn Museum, Exhibition of Spanish Painting, 4 - 31 October 1935, no. 45;
St. Paul, Minnesota, St. Paul Art Center, The Age of Belief: an exhibition of religious art from the Harding Museum Collections, 1966–67, no. 2.

J. A. Gaya Nuño, La pintura española fuera de España, Madrid 1958, p. 238, cat. no. 1824 (as by Morales);
I. Bäcksbacka, Luis de Morales, trans. L.-I. Ringbom, Helsinki 1962, p. 197, cat. no. 60 (listed under studio works and copies);
R.G. Mann in M. Wolff et al., Northern European and Spanish Paintings before 1600 in the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago 2008, pp. 95-99, reproduced.

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting on wood looks respectable in its current condition. The panel has been cradled on the reverse. The panel is flat and the paint layer is stable. The work may not be clean and a few of the retouches have discolored. An old crack running vertically through the nose of the Madonna is visible, but this is a very thin crack, and there are only a few spots of retouching around the side of the nose in her face. A few cracks have been retouched in the white dress. There are a few more spots of retouching in her right hand. A few cracks have been retouched in the figure of Christ, but his face is almost completely un-retouched. The black background has also received a few retouches that are not immediately visible under ultraviolet light. In general, the condition is good. If the color of some of the old retouches were adjusted, the work could be hung as is.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

This Pietà is a fine example of Morales’s devotional images of the grieving Virgin Mary for which he was so justly famous.  In his Arte de la pintura, the artist and writer Francesco Pacheco (1564-1644) wrote that Morales’s depictions of this subject were so poignant that they “could move stones to devotion."¹  The Virgin gently cradles the dead Christ in her arms, gazing down at him mournfully.  Christ is painted in ashen hues, with the whites of his upturned eyes barely visible through the narrow slits of his eyelids.  Though he no longer wears the crown of thorns, blood still drips from the wounds on his forehead.  The starkness of the composition, with the two figures dominating the picture plane, creates a powerful image and one that Morales painted in numerous variations to meet the demands of his clientele.  Morales’s style reflects an awareness of both the Northern and Italian schools, with his use of Leonardesque sfumato effects and a composition based on Netherlandish prototypes.

Stylistically, the Art Institute panel appears to fit in with works produced late in Morales’s career, circa 1578-1585.  The intense expressiveness achieved by omitting any extraneous elements is comparable to that of other such late works as Ecce Homo (Gonzalo Albarrán, Badojoz) and Saint Jerome (Badajoz Cathedral), and the handling of the anatomy is more simplifiedthan in the previous decades.²   

1.  See R.G. Mann, in M. Wolff, ed., Northern European and Spanish Paintings before 1600 in the Art Institute of Chicago, New Haven and London, 2008, p. 97 and p. 99, note 8.
2. Op.cit., p. 99.