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Lot Essay
The present works were a gift from Marie Fitzpatrick, Countess of Montijo, to her daughter, Eugnie Marie de Montijo de Guzman, Countess of Teba (1826-1920), on the occasion of her marriage to Emperor Napoleon III in 1853. Although more interested in the causes of social progress and industrial development, the latter did nonetheless greatly encourage the expansion of the national collections. The Empress also contributed to this initiative: in 1863 she created a Chinese Museum at the chteau of Fontainebleau. Their personal collection of paintings (sold at Christie's on July 1, 1927) reveals a preference for 19th century portraiture and landscape painting with some interest in Old Masters such as Jacob van Ruisdael, Philips Wouwerman, Canaletto and Francesco Guardi. In such company the present pair of devotional paintings must have seemed all the more remarkable.
It was not until 1937 that the two figures were identified as Saints Acisclo and Victoria (see F. J. Snchez Cantn, loc. cit.). The brother and sister were accorded the status of patron saints of Cordoba, Castillo's birthplace, by virtue of being the first Christians to die for their faith in a city subjected to domination from Rome and then the Moors. They were executed in 303 AD during the religious persecutions of the Emperor Diocletian. According to their story, as told by Mrtin Roa in Flos Sanctorum. Fiestas i Santos naturales de la Ciudad de Crdoba, 1615, they endured many forms of torture, including abuses with fire and hot oil. Victoria had her tongue and breasts cut off before eventually being killed with arrows, while Acisclo was beheaded in the Roman amphitheater.
Given their status as patron saints of the city and Castillo's emergence as its leading artist, it is not surprising that he represented them on more than one occasion. He painted Saint Acisclo early on in his career in a large work in Cordoba Cathedral intended as a competition panel for the paintings of the principle retable. Antonio Palomino, who is Castillo's first biographer (Museo pictrico, 1715-24), cites two half-length figures of the saints in the Hermita de la Consalacin, Cordoba, which may possibly be those recorded as being in a private collection in Madrid according to photo files at F.A.R.L. Two full-length representations are documented by the Cordoban historian R. Ramirez de Arellano in his Inventario monumental y artstico de la provincia de Crdoba as being in the convent of La Encarnacin in Cordoba.
Stylistically the present paintings accord well with Castillo's style circa 1650. His figures still bear an echo of Zurbarn, whose art he had come to know during a visit to Seville in early 1635 (for further biographical details, please see the note to lot 186). While the Sevillan master's influence is evident in the younger artist's works of the 1640s, Castillo's own artistic personality begins to emerge in the following decade. His mature style for devotional paintings might be termed monumentalizing: his figures are large and powerfully built and tend to dominate their alloted stage-sets. The mood is one of silence, evoked by the seeming inertia of the figures and their steadfast unflinching gaze, which is quite unlike the pious rapture of Zurbarn's saints.
The present paintings date from the most successful years of Castillo's life (1650-5). In 1652 he was declared the 'best artist in Cordoba' by a city councilman presenting one of his paintings, The Archangel Raphael, as a gift to the city to commemorate the end of the plague in Cordoba. Whereafter he began to receive important commissions. Dr Mindy Nancarrow Taggard (private communication, Sept. 22, 1995) suggests such public recognition brought the artist self-assurance and a measure of personal pride, which perhaps explains why there are so many signed and dated paintings for the period 1650-2, whereas there are almost none for the rest of his career. The AC monogram has led to the erroneous attribution of works by Castillo to Alonso Cano (1601-1667), as, in fact, was the case with the present paintings when they were sold as works by the older artist in the sale of the estate of the Empress Eugnie (see Provenance).
We are grateful for Dr. Mindy Nancarrow Taggard for her assistance in cataloguing the paintings in this lot, which will be included in her forthcoming catalogue raisonn of works by the artist.
It was not until 1937 that the two figures were identified as Saints Acisclo and Victoria (see F. J. Snchez Cantn, loc. cit.). The brother and sister were accorded the status of patron saints of Cordoba, Castillo's birthplace, by virtue of being the first Christians to die for their faith in a city subjected to domination from Rome and then the Moors. They were executed in 303 AD during the religious persecutions of the Emperor Diocletian. According to their story, as told by Mrtin Roa in Flos Sanctorum. Fiestas i Santos naturales de la Ciudad de Crdoba, 1615, they endured many forms of torture, including abuses with fire and hot oil. Victoria had her tongue and breasts cut off before eventually being killed with arrows, while Acisclo was beheaded in the Roman amphitheater.
Given their status as patron saints of the city and Castillo's emergence as its leading artist, it is not surprising that he represented them on more than one occasion. He painted Saint Acisclo early on in his career in a large work in Cordoba Cathedral intended as a competition panel for the paintings of the principle retable. Antonio Palomino, who is Castillo's first biographer (Museo pictrico, 1715-24), cites two half-length figures of the saints in the Hermita de la Consalacin, Cordoba, which may possibly be those recorded as being in a private collection in Madrid according to photo files at F.A.R.L. Two full-length representations are documented by the Cordoban historian R. Ramirez de Arellano in his Inventario monumental y artstico de la provincia de Crdoba as being in the convent of La Encarnacin in Cordoba.
Stylistically the present paintings accord well with Castillo's style circa 1650. His figures still bear an echo of Zurbarn, whose art he had come to know during a visit to Seville in early 1635 (for further biographical details, please see the note to lot 186). While the Sevillan master's influence is evident in the younger artist's works of the 1640s, Castillo's own artistic personality begins to emerge in the following decade. His mature style for devotional paintings might be termed monumentalizing: his figures are large and powerfully built and tend to dominate their alloted stage-sets. The mood is one of silence, evoked by the seeming inertia of the figures and their steadfast unflinching gaze, which is quite unlike the pious rapture of Zurbarn's saints.
The present paintings date from the most successful years of Castillo's life (1650-5). In 1652 he was declared the 'best artist in Cordoba' by a city councilman presenting one of his paintings, The Archangel Raphael, as a gift to the city to commemorate the end of the plague in Cordoba. Whereafter he began to receive important commissions. Dr Mindy Nancarrow Taggard (private communication, Sept. 22, 1995) suggests such public recognition brought the artist self-assurance and a measure of personal pride, which perhaps explains why there are so many signed and dated paintings for the period 1650-2, whereas there are almost none for the rest of his career. The AC monogram has led to the erroneous attribution of works by Castillo to Alonso Cano (1601-1667), as, in fact, was the case with the present paintings when they were sold as works by the older artist in the sale of the estate of the Empress Eugnie (see Provenance).
We are grateful for Dr. Mindy Nancarrow Taggard for her assistance in cataloguing the paintings in this lot, which will be included in her forthcoming catalogue raisonn of works by the artist.