This circular depiction of the Holy Family had been attributed to Juan Fernández de Navarrete, known as "El Mudo” ("the Mute," 1526-1579), because entry no. 47 from the “Escuela Española” in Echeverría's inventory lists it as: "by Navarrete the mute." In 1975, Jonathan Brown attributed this "charming” drawing to Francisco de Herrera the Younger and dated it to the 1660s, the period in which the Seville Academy was founded and shortly before Herrera left Seville for Madrid.
The swift and skillful pen strokes follow a preliminary drawing in black pencil. The wash places the child almost completely in shadow and brightly illuminates the Virgin at the center of the composition from a light source behind the child's head. Red chalk and added black pencil give the Christ Child a bit more volume, sharpen Mary's profile, and intensify the shadows in the darkest areas. Joseph remains half in shadow at the picture's right edge, and the barely recognizable dove of the Holy Ghost, toward which the child appears to be extending his right arm, hovers above the light. This distinct manipulation of light suggests that the artist intended to produce a painting that would hang above the viewer.

Jens Hoffmann-Samland

Details zu diesem Werk

• Provenienz

  [José Atanasio Echeverría]; Julian Benjamin Williams, Seville (d. 1866); John Wetherell (?) (d. 1865); Horatio/Nathan Wetherell (?) (until 1874); Frederick William Cosens, London (from 1874 to 1890); Sotheby's, London, auction of the property of Frederick William Cosens (from November 11 to 21, 1890); Bernard Quaritch Ltd., London (from November 1890 to July 1891); acquired by the Hamburger Kunsthalle (July 14, 1891).

• Bibliographie

  Drawings by Herrera the Younger and a Follower, Jonathan Brown, 1975, S. 238, Abb. S. pl. 9, Abb.-Nr. , Kat.-Nr. 10

  The Spanish Gesture. Drawings from Murillo to Goya in the Hamburger Kunsthalle, Jens Hoffmann-Samland, with contributions by María Cruz de Carlos Varona, Gabriele Finaldi, José Manuel Matilla u. a., 2014, S. 219, Abb., Abb.-Nr. , Kat.-Nr. 97

  Die Spanischen Handzeichnungen in der Hamburger Kunsthalle zu Hamburg, August Liebmann Mayer, 1918, S. 111, Abb.-Nr.