Nine monumental paintings by El Greco once decorated monastery walls in Toledo, Spain, where the Greek-born artist spent most of his career. Most of these canvases eventually ended up elsewhere—but now, thanks to Madrid’s Prado Museum, they are hanging together again for the first time since the 19th century.
“The Result Could Not Have Been More Dazzling”
It was shortly after El Greco settled in Toldeo that he received his first major commission from Diego de Castilla, a high-ranking cleric and dean of the local cathedral, and a Portuguese woman named Doña María de Silva. El Greco was tasked with painting altarpieces for the newly-constructed Monastery of Santo Domingo el Antiguo at Toledo’s oldest convent. Diego’s son Luis had previously become acquainted with the artist in Rome and personally recommended him for the project.
Over the course of two years, El Greco produced nine altarpiece paintings to decorate the new monastery. “The result could not have been more dazzling,” said the Prado Museum in a statement. “He revealed himself as a perfectly developed artist, with a creative maturity that linked him to some of the best painters of the Italian Renaissance. These canvases also captured the fundamental aspects of El Greco’s characteristic pictorial construction.”
Today, just three of El Greco’s altarpiece paintings remain in situ: depictions of John the Evangelist and John the Baptist, and The Resurrection. The rest were dispersed from the monastery during the 19th century, ending up in museums and private collections worldwide.
Prado Museum Brings Together Eight Altarpieces
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Nearly two centuries after the altarpiece paintings were last seen together, Madrid’s Prado Museum reunited eight of the nine canvases made for the Monastery of Santo Domingo el Antiguo. The exhibition, titled El Greco. Santo Domingo el Antiguio, was made possible by the loan of the central altarpiece, The Assumption, which has belonged to the Art Institute of Chicago since 1906. The Prado Museum also managed to convince the nuns at the monastesry to let them borrow the paintings still residing there. The Louvre Museum had previously tried and failed to borrow the same works.
El Greco’s The Assumption depicts the Virgin Mary ascending to heaven on a crescent moon over Jesus Christ’s open tomb. Another piece, titled The Trinity, was originally positioned above it. The Assumption was also flanked by four other canvases depicting John the Baptist and St. Bernard on the left side, and John the Evangelist and St. Benedict on the right side. These figures acted as intermediaries between heaven and earth. According to El Pais, a Spanish newspaper, St. Bernard is the only work not included in the Prado Museum’s exhibition, as the painting belongs to the Hermitage Museum in Moscow and could not travel to Spain.
Who Was El Greco?
El Greco (1541-1614) was the nickname of Doménikos Theotokópoulos, a Greek-born artist who studied in Italy and worked in Spain during the Counter-Reformation. Comprising elongated forms, artificially compressed space, and unnatural color combinations, his work often confused his contemporaries. Now, centuries later, his expressive style remains instantly recognizable.
Many creative and cultural influences converge in El Greco’s oeuvre: the Eastern Orthodox devotional art of his native Crete, the rich colors and bold brushstrokes of Titian‘s Venitian studio, Michelangelo’s late-career experimentation with Mannerism in Rome, and the resurgence of Catholic art in Spain. The Mannerist movement, named after the Italian word for “style,” emphasized artists’ technical virtuosity over the objective naturalism of the High Renaissance. El Greco is remembered as one of the most innovative artists associated with Mannerism.
