Study for "The Assumption of the Virgin" for San Augustín, Seville (c. 1670–72): Art, History and Details

Study for "The Assumption of the Virgin" for San Augustín, Seville (c. 1670–72) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Juan de Valdés Leal (Spanish, 1622–1690).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This painting is a sketch for a large altarpiece. The rough, flickering surface, the unusually sharp contrast of hot and cool hues, and the compression of space all characterize the artist’s intense spirituality and unique technique. While often held apart from the sweetness and grace of Murillo (also represented in the collection), his contemporary in Seville, the two artists worked closely together on commissions and often presented their work side by side, speaking to the stylistic diversity and religious complexity preferred by patrons in Seville during the late 1600s.

Object facts

• Title: Study for "The Assumption of the Virgin" for San Augustín, Seville
• Date: c. 1670–72
• Creator attribution: Juan de Valdés Leal (Spanish, 1622–1690)
• Culture: Spain
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on wood
• Dimensions: Framed: 52.3 x 39 cm (20 9/16 x 15 3/8 in.); Unframed: 40.3 x 26.6 cm (15 7/8 x 10 1/2 in.)
• Collection: P - Spanish before 1800
• Department: European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1987.7

Collection credit

Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Turner, Evan H. “The Year in Review for 1987.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 75, no. 2 (February 1988): 30–71.
• Lurie, Ann Tzeutschler. "More about Valdés Leal's Sketches for Seville's Assumption of the Virgin and Immaculate Conception." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 8 (1992): 288-303.
• Valdés Leal, Juan de, Ignacio Cano Rivero, María del Valme Muñoz Rubio, and Ignacio Hermoso Romero. Valdés Leal: 1622-1690. Sevilla : Junta de Andalucía, Consejería de Cultura y Patrimonio Histórico,2021.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.