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拍品專文
The city of Cuzco was one of the most dynamic and thriving centers of artistic production in the Viceroyalty of Peru. Numerous records detail the many workshops that flourished during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. They employed foreign and local artisans, apprentices and others, who engaged in the creation of religious paintings, sculptures and decoration for churches, convents and monasteries which attest to the city's cultural importance. Commissions, both public and private, made Cuzco and the Altiplano region of Calamarca centers for great religious art such as the present lots (168, 169) Archangel with Harquebus, Asiel (Timor dei)—he who fears God and Archangel with Harquebus, Eliel—my God is God.
The extraordinary depictions of ángeles arcabuseros—angels attired in luxuriant garments embroidered in gold and silver that mimicked the aristocratic fashion of Andean society of the time bearing muskets or “harquebuses”—proved perfect didactic images in the early evangelization of the native peoples by the missionary orders. The harquebus was a firearm at the vanguard of weaponry technology and had been used in European wars since the early seventeenth century inspiring awe and power. The native population which included the Inca royalty could also identify with these exalted creatures who like them were warriors. Their abundant plumage-adorned hats and their exquisite feathered wings conveyed a supernatural manifestation which encouraged pious veneration. This dazzling portrayal of a fearless angelic soldier continued to be used as a powerful symbol of the Church Militant during the Counter Reformation in the Americas. The stunning winged creatures were God’s army and defenders of the faith and all Christians against heresy that included Protestant ideology and the pantheon of Inca gods. Asiel and Eliel are each portrayed with their respective attributes or duties. Asiel is entrusted with God’s cleansing and purifying instrument—fire, painted as a small flame at his feet—and Eliel with the key to the Abyss where demons dwell.
Remarkably, the particular iconography for the various archangels painted in the New World did not always adhere to strict guidance and rules set by the Church after the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and its enforcer the Supreme Council of the Inquisition. [1] While archangels such as Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael were part of the scriptures officially included in the Church’s canon, these fantastic figures, or ángeles extraordinarios, Uriel, Jehudiel, Barachiel, and Selatiel, were part of so-called apocryphal texts, and therefore prohibited. It must be noted that these angels were part of the canon of Greek Orthodox Church with which the Church of Rome had broken in 1054. The discovery in 1516 of a Byzantine mural of seven archangels in a church in Palermo (Sicily) led to a rebirth of their cult, not only in Italy, but also in Spain and its overseas empire where they enjoyed the enthusiastic support of the Spanish monarchy. Indeed, murals with these figures adorned the walls of the royal convents such as Las Delcazas Reales and Encarnación in Madrid. More importantly though, as Sicily was part of the Spanish Empire and Spain was the Church’s staunchest ally, the veneration of angels continued to thrive in all of the Spanish territories in Europe, the New World and its far-flung possessions in Asia.
Margarita Aguilar, Doctoral Candidate, The Graduate Center, City University of New York
1 Soyer, François. “Inquisition, Art, and Self-Censorship in the Early Modern Spanish Church, 1563–1834.” The Art of Veiled Speech: Self-Censorship from Aristophanes to Hobbes, edited by Han Baltussen and Peter J. Davis, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015, pp. 269–292. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt169zt6h.15, 276-278.
The extraordinary depictions of ángeles arcabuseros—angels attired in luxuriant garments embroidered in gold and silver that mimicked the aristocratic fashion of Andean society of the time bearing muskets or “harquebuses”—proved perfect didactic images in the early evangelization of the native peoples by the missionary orders. The harquebus was a firearm at the vanguard of weaponry technology and had been used in European wars since the early seventeenth century inspiring awe and power. The native population which included the Inca royalty could also identify with these exalted creatures who like them were warriors. Their abundant plumage-adorned hats and their exquisite feathered wings conveyed a supernatural manifestation which encouraged pious veneration. This dazzling portrayal of a fearless angelic soldier continued to be used as a powerful symbol of the Church Militant during the Counter Reformation in the Americas. The stunning winged creatures were God’s army and defenders of the faith and all Christians against heresy that included Protestant ideology and the pantheon of Inca gods. Asiel and Eliel are each portrayed with their respective attributes or duties. Asiel is entrusted with God’s cleansing and purifying instrument—fire, painted as a small flame at his feet—and Eliel with the key to the Abyss where demons dwell.
Remarkably, the particular iconography for the various archangels painted in the New World did not always adhere to strict guidance and rules set by the Church after the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and its enforcer the Supreme Council of the Inquisition. [1] While archangels such as Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael were part of the scriptures officially included in the Church’s canon, these fantastic figures, or ángeles extraordinarios, Uriel, Jehudiel, Barachiel, and Selatiel, were part of so-called apocryphal texts, and therefore prohibited. It must be noted that these angels were part of the canon of Greek Orthodox Church with which the Church of Rome had broken in 1054. The discovery in 1516 of a Byzantine mural of seven archangels in a church in Palermo (Sicily) led to a rebirth of their cult, not only in Italy, but also in Spain and its overseas empire where they enjoyed the enthusiastic support of the Spanish monarchy. Indeed, murals with these figures adorned the walls of the royal convents such as Las Delcazas Reales and Encarnación in Madrid. More importantly though, as Sicily was part of the Spanish Empire and Spain was the Church’s staunchest ally, the veneration of angels continued to thrive in all of the Spanish territories in Europe, the New World and its far-flung possessions in Asia.
Margarita Aguilar, Doctoral Candidate, The Graduate Center, City University of New York
1 Soyer, François. “Inquisition, Art, and Self-Censorship in the Early Modern Spanish Church, 1563–1834.” The Art of Veiled Speech: Self-Censorship from Aristophanes to Hobbes, edited by Han Baltussen and Peter J. Davis, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015, pp. 269–292. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt169zt6h.15, 276-278.