Jusepe de Ribera, lo Spagnoletto

Abstract

The name Jusepe de Ribera—“lo Spagnoletto” as his contemporaries called him—conjures up images of pedestrian-looking saints suffering gruesome martyrdoms or undergoing painful penitential experiences. Such associations have served as the foundation for popular descriptions and summary emotional responses to the art of Ribera since nineteenth-century romantics first revived interest in the artist by accenting the horrific qualities of his canvases. Preoccupied with the passionately dramatic and realistic, writers like Byron enthusiastically exclaimed that Ribera “tainted his brush with the blood of all the saints.” Among scholars, however, romantic notions eventually gave way to more objective assessments, and finally, after a century of considerable effort to illuminate the artist's life and career, the first major retrospective of his paintings has taken place at the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas (December 4, 1982–February 6, 1983).

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