Saint Martin and the Beggar (El Greco)

San Martín y el mendigo
	El Greco , 1597-1599
	Oil on canvas
	193.5 × 103 cm
	National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Saint Martin and the Beggar ( spanish San Martín y el mendigo , English Saint Martin and the Beggar ) is a picture of the Cretan , mannerist painter El Greco (Dominikos Theotokopoulos) of about 1597 to 1599. There are several explanations. Two of them are currently in the collection of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC , and the Art Institute of Chicago , Chicago .

history

The painting was commissioned by Martín Ramírez, founder of the San José Chapel in Toledo .

description

The picture shows a scene from the legend of Saint Martin : The saint cuts his cloak and gives half of it to a beggar.

The pictures are painted in oil on canvas. A smaller version of the painting is in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Saint Martin and the Beggar , 1597–1600, 110 × 63 cm, Art Institute of Chicago

The two versions only differ in details. While the larger picture has dimensions of 193.5 × 103 cm, the smaller picture in Chicago is only 110 × 63 cm. For this, the landscape in the background is shown more clearly.

The painting depicts Saint Martin on a white Arab with the naked beggar - in front of an imaginatively composed background of a " southern Spanish " landscape. The ice-blue, cloudy sky merges behind the figures into a mountainous landscape with the city of Toledo and a high arched bridge over the Tagus . The large paddle wheel of a "bucket mill" ( Spanish molino de cubo ) with an aqueduct determines the intermediate area.

Beggars and saints may have real portraits as models. Seen from below, both appear monumental and tower above the landscape. The figures and also the horse, which occupies the foreground, are depicted in a naturalistic way with great detail. The naked beggar, wounded in the leg, who is pushed to the left in the picture, looks up with grateful eyes at the saint, who is depicted as a Spanish nobleman with reddish hair. The format emphasizes the length of the figures, which nestle against one another from the center to the left. The green cloak of the saint, which also covers the beggar's nakedness, is drawn as a ribbon through the center of the picture and clearly separates the sphere of earth from heaven.

Web links

Commons : El Greco: Saint Martin and the Beggar - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ Saint Martin and the Beggar . National Gallery of Art . Retrieved October 9, 2014.
↑ ^a ^b ^c nga.gov : Saint Martin and the Beggar, 1597/1599. (English, accessed November 10, 2020)
↑ Spanish Painter ... El Greco . In: Kentucky New Era , July 28, 1962. Retrieved October 9, 2014.
↑ About This Artwork: Saint Martin and the Beggar . Art Institute of Chicago . Retrieved October 9, 2014.

[National_Gallery_of_Art_-_Saint_Martin_and_the_Beggar-1] Saint Martin and the Beggar . National Gallery of Art . Retrieved October 9, 2014.

[NGA-2] .gov : Saint Martin and the Beggar, 1597/1599. (English, accessed November 10, 2020)

[Kentucky_New_Era_-_28_July_1962_-_Spanish_Painter_..._El_Greco-3] Spanish Painter ... El Greco . In: Kentucky New Era , July 28, 1962. Retrieved October 9, 2014.

[4] About This Artwork: Saint Martin and the Beggar . Art Institute of Chicago . Retrieved October 9, 2014.