Luis González Velázquez (25 August 1715 – 24 May 1763) was a Spanish late-

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

painter. Velázquez was born in

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

into a family of artists; his father

Pablo González Velázquez Pablo González Velázquez (1664–1727) was a Spanish Baroque sculptor. According to the art historian Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez, who is the provider of all known biographical details, Velázquez was born in Jaén, Spain, Jaén and was th ...

and brothers Alejandro and

Antonio Antonio is a masculine given name of Etruscan origin deriving from the root name Antonius. It is a common name among Romance language-speaking populations as well as the Balkans and Lusophone Africa. It has been among the top 400 most popular male ...

were all painters. He studied painting at the School Board for the establishment of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando where he was elected academician of merit in 1753 and deputy director of painting a year later. Between 1741 and 1742 he worked in

La Puebla de Montalbán La Puebla de Montalbán is a Spanish town and municipality in the province of Toledo, in the autonomous community of Castile-La Mancha. It is located in a plain of the River Tajo. Government The mayor of La Puebla de Montalbán is Juan José ...

, (

Province of Toledo Toledo is a province of central Spain, in the western part of the autonomous community of Castile–La Mancha. It is bordered by the provinces of Madrid, Cuenca, Ciudad Real, Badajoz, Cáceres, and Ávila. Its capital is the city of Toledo. ...

), where he executed the murals in the chapel of Our Lady of Solitude, including a series of biblical heroines, which manifests emphatically a

rococo Rococo (, also ), less commonly Roccoco or Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and theatrical style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, ...

style. Since 1744, he collaborated with Santiago Bonavía in the decorations of the theater of

Buen Retiro Park The Buen Retiro Park (Spanish: ''Parque del Buen Retiro'', literally "Good retirement park"), Retiro Park or simply El Retiro is one of the largest parks of the city of Madrid, Spain. The park belonged to the Spanish Monarchy until the late 19th ...

. In April 1758 Corrado Giaquinto stated in a memorial that Velázquez had worked under him in the decoration of the Royal Salesians. The same year he was appointed court painter, with a staff of 9,000 reales per year, although the small number of works made for the King suggests that the title was mostly honorary. Velázquez and his wife Luisa had at least one daughter. He died in Madrid on 24 May 1763.

External links and references

* Cean Bermudez, John Augustine, Historical Dictionary of the most distinguished teachers of the Fine Arts in Spain, Madrid, 1800, vol. 2, p. 226. * Pastor Gutierrez, Ismael, "Portrait of Luis Gonzalez Velazquez ', Yearbook of the Department of History and Theory of Art, No. 1, 1989, p. 139-146.
Scholarly articles
in English about Luis González Velázquez @ th
Spanish Old Masters Gallery
1715 births 1763 deaths 18th-century Spanish painters 18th-century Spanish male artists Spanish male painters Spanish Baroque painters People from Madrid {{Spain-painter-stub