FRANCISCO DE ZURBARAN at the National Gallery on the 10th of August 2026

 

FRANCISCO DE ZURBARAN at the National Gallery on the 10^th of August 2026

 

Francisco de Zurbaran (1598-1664) was born in the remote Spanish province of Extremadura (meaning ‘hard earth’) but was sent to Seville in 1614 by his father to become the apprentice of Pedro Diaz de Villanueva, an artist of which not much is known.  Seville had become rich from the wealth of the Americas, and it was here that Zurbaran began to build an extensive clientele among the religious orders who had begun to benefit from this wealth and wanted expressive, new art that would reinforce the supposed spiritual certainties that they espoused.  Zurbaran depicted religious scenes to order, realist work with surreal elements.

Zurbaran depicts classic church iconography such as Madonna and Child. The Crucifixion, Martyrs and Saints with a new emphasis on historical detail and research.  For instance, in his work The Circumcision (1639, oil on canvas) he draws, with accuracy, the surgical implement employed.  Stark contrasts of light and darkness enhance the power of Zurbaran’s image making and led to him being known as ‘the Spanish Caravaggio’.  Zurbaran also sold his work in the New World, to the new Spanish colonies, the vice royalties of Peru and New Spain.

Little is known of Zurbaran’s life.  At this time artist’s biographies were of no public interest whatever, except in some exceptional cases, because artists enjoyed the status of servants and had no independence whatever to pursue their own subject matter.  Zurbaran’s public art consisted of devotional scenes because these were paid for by the religious orders.  The art market, whereby wealthy patrons might pay for their likenesses and those of their families, only emerged in the following century in northern countries like England and Holland. Only a royal family could afford (or was allowed) to commission portraits and Zurbaran’s contemporary Diego Velazquez (1599-60) filled the post of court artist alongside other minor artists.

Zurbaran’s images of the crucifixion, for instance his work Christ on the Cross (1627, oil on canvas) are sombre works, replete with spiritual and emotional insight into the nature of suffering and transcendence.  The exceptionally pale body of Christ, a copious, detailed and finally realised loincloth tied to his waste is contrasted with the blackest background imaginable.  The body of Christ emerges from this background, focussing our attention solely on the identity and suffering of Christ.  These devotional pieces were intended to concentrate the minds of worshippers on Christ’s passion and death.  Other works by Zurbaran emphasize another fundamental idea of the catholic church, for instance his Immaculate Conception (1632, oil on canvas), foregrounding Mary as both mother and virgin, combining the spiritual and physical birth with Christ as idea or word (logos).  The Protestant theological tradition disapproved of this catholic interpretation of the gospels which is not based on textual evidence.

Zurbaran's crucifixion scenes imply that there is only the light of faith beyond which is the darkness of ignorance, sin and the devil.  His paintings offer stark alternatives, the comfort of salvation contrasted with eternal night, damnation, cold interstellar spaces where lost souls persist somehow, along with the undead, unborn, unalloyed.  There is no middle ground where doubt can be entertained.  Church dogma is necessary so that existence is grounded in faith alone.  Zurbaran is the image maker of the Spanish Inquisition, that seeks clarity while condemning doubters to the pit, to the outer darkness of Hell and damnation.

Many critics have noted Zurbaran’s skilful rendering of cloth and fabrics; he may indeed have worked in the fabric trade in Seville in his early career there.  He completed only ten or so still lives, even so they are among the most significant productions of the Spanish Baroque era.  Zurbaran competed against important artists like Murillo and Velazquez; his son Juan was also an artist.  When these still lives were re-discovered in the 1920s, they were compared to works by Cezanne and Picasso.  The modelling, use of light cast and shadow and the intense coloration make them seem abstract.  It’s clear that Zurbaran used these smaller intimate pieces as preparatory work for his commissions, grand alter pieces and devotional works.

Zurbaran’s son Juan (1620-1649) was also a painter, indeed, some of his paintings are presented in this exhibition.  In 1649 Seville was struck by plague and Juan died during the epidemic along with several of his brothers.  His father later moved to Madrid where his style became looser and less formal.  The power and visceral quality of Zurbaran’s art are undoubtedly summed up in his late work Agnus Dei (Lamb of God, 1635-40, oil on canvas) symbolising Christ the scape goat whose suffering and death established the link between the temporal and the eternal.  The intimate realisation of the lamb’s wool, coat and bound feet establish pity and empathy then displaced to Zurbaran’s image of the crucifixion.

The sombre tones and hues of Zurbaran’s painting make him seem an extension of the catholic church, but he is really seeking out commercial possibilities for the expressive power of his undoubted creativity.  He was initially tied to the religious orders and accepted the limitations imposed upon him by this authority who saw an opportunity to exploit his work but also viewed it as dangerous and disturbing.  Zurbaran moves forward with this authority to establish a clear vision of society, religion and order.  Anarchic forces like warfare and plague would constantly impinge on this serenity and eventually emerge to almost overwhelm it.

Paul Murphy, the National Gallery, August 2026