Follower of Domenikos Theotokopoulos, called El Greco

St. Francis and Brother Leo meditating on death

Details

Follower of Domenikos Theotokopoulos, called El Greco
St. Francis and Brother Leo meditating on death
indistinctly inscribed in Greek (lower right)
oil on canvas
62¼ x 40¼ in. (158.5 x 102.2 cm.)

Provenance

(Presumably) Maximo Peña, Madrid.
Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 9 December 2004, lot 175.

Literature

M. Legendre et al., Domenikos Theotokopoulos, called El Greco, Paris, 1937, p. 404, illustrated (no dimensions noted).
J. Camón Aznar, Domenico Greco, Madrid, 1950, p. 541, fig. 396 (no dimensions noted).
(Possibly) H.E. Wethey, El Greco and his School, Princeton, 1962, vol. II, p. 236, no. X-345, under 'School works, copies, and wrong attributions' (no dimensions noted, location unknown).

Lot Essay

The present painting is a seventeenth-century copy after an original composition by El Greco. One of the six autograph versions is in the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (see H.E. Wethey, El Greco and his School, New Jersey, 1962, vol. I, p. 124, no. 225, reproduced vol. II, fig. 275). Wethey notes that there are numerous replicas after these originals, produced both during El Greco's lifetime and throughout the seventeenth-century. The scale of the present work, close to that of the painting in Ottawa (66 x 40 5/8 in.) and the inclusion of the seal and card bearing an inscription, are not common to all of the copies.

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