Master of Avila
The Master of Avila ( Spanish Maestro de Ávila) is a Spanish-Castilian painter who worked in the city of Avila in what was then the Kingdom of Castile after 1470 . The artist, who is not known by name, got his emergency name after his small-format triptych , which depicts the birth of Christ and the adoration of the shepherds and the Magi. The work comes from a convent in the city of Avila and is now in the Museo Lázaro Galdiano in Madrid (inv. No. 2910). A few other paintings were assigned to the master around this work, which he is said to have created, for example, for the church of the city, which today belongs to the province of Castile-León, and other clients from the region.
During the lifetime of the Master of Avila , today's Spain was still divided into independent provinces. The master himself belongs to an independent Castilian style of painting, which was also influenced by the stylistic developments of the Kingdom of Naples in Italy, which was connected to Spain . Furthermore, the more important stylistic influences of Dutch painters from Brabant and Flanders can be seen , which, among other things, were related to the Spanish region. The master of Avila echoes, for example, Roger van der Weyden or the master of Flémalle . Even if the style of the master of Avila can be counted towards the early Renaissance and the transition phase between the Gothic and the Renaissance in Castile, it is nonetheless committed to a more traditional late medieval iconography .
The works of the master of Avila show that his clients, such as the church or the surroundings of the house Álvarez de Toledo in Ávila, showed little interest in innovations in the high Renaissance art that was already flourishing in Italy. There, for example, a new direction in painting was promoted by the Medici or the papacy, while on the Iberian Peninsula the understanding of art in the Middle Ages only slowly began to change. Nevertheless, it can be assumed that the master of Avila was familiar with works by important painters of a Spanish Renaissance such as Fernando Gallego (1440–1507) or with the Spanish painter Pedro Berruguete (1455–1504), who moved to Spain around 1480 after working in Italy returned and also worked in Avila. It has been suggested that the Master of Avila was the painter García del Barco, whose work for Avila Cathedral is traceable between 1465 and 1476.
In addition to the eponymous work of the triptych from Avila, the master from Avila is ascribed to altarpieces in the cathedral and other churches in Avila, as well as a triptych in the museum of Vittoria in Spain or a crucifixion scene in the Prado in Madrid.
literature
- August Liebmann Mayer : The D. José Lázaro Galdeano Collection in Madrid. In: The Cicerone. Half-monthly publication for artists, art lovers and collectors. Vol. 2, No. 9, May 1910, ZDB -ID 215665-9 , p. 308 ff.
- August Liebmann Mayer: Segovia, Avila and El Eskorial (= Famous Art Places . Vol. 61, ZDB -ID 515789-4 ). Seemann, Leipzig 1913.
- Chandler Rathfon Post: The Hispano-Flemish Style in North-Western Spain (= A History of Spanish Painting. Vol. 4, 1-2). 2 volumes. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA 1933.
- José Camón Aznar: Guía abreviada del museo Lázaro Galdiano. Fundación "Lázaro Galdiano", Madrid 1951
- Josep Gudiol Ricart: El Maestro de Ávila. In: Goya. No. 21, November / December 1957, ZDB -ID 217060-7 , pp. 138-145.
- Matías Díaz Padrón, Angelina Torné Payatos: La Crucifixión atribuida a Fernando Gallego del Museo del Prado, restituida al Maestro de Ávila. In: Boletín del Museo del Prado. Vol. 7, No. 20, 1986, ISSN 0210-8143 , pp. 75-80.
- Carlos Saguar Quer (Ed.): Guía breve del museo Lázaro Galdiano. Fundación “Lázaro Galdiano”, Madrid 2005, ISBN 84-93373-60-5 .
- Sonia Caballero Escamilla: Sobre el Maestro de Avila y el Tríptico del Nacimiento. In: Goya. No. 319/320, 2007, pp. 299-312.
- Darwin Porter, Danforth Prince: Frommer's Spain 2008. Wiley, Hoboken NJ et al. 2007, ISBN 978-0-470-13825-0 .
Web links
- Nativity , Master of Avial at Museo Lázaro Galdiano