Pedro de Orrente (April 1580, Murcia – 19 January 1645,

Valencia Valencia ( va, València) is the capital of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Valencian Community, Valencia and the Municipalities of Spain, third-most populated municipality in Spain, with 791,413 inhabitants. It is ...

) was a Spanish painter of the early

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 ...

period who became one of the first artists in that part of Spain to paint in a Naturalistic style.

Biography

His father, Jaime de Horrente, was a merchant from

Marseilles Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...

who had settled in Murcia in 1573. There is some documentary evidence that he was the friend of an otherwise unknown painter named Juan de Arizmendi, who probably gave Pedro his first lessons. By 1600, Pedro was in

Toledo Toledo most commonly refers to: * Toledo, Spain, a city in Spain * Province of Toledo, Spain * Toledo, Ohio, a city in the United States Toledo may also refer to: Places Belize * Toledo District * Toledo Settlement Bolivia * Toledo, Orur ...

, where he was hired to create an altarpiece in the village of Guadarrama. It has not been preserved. He attracted little more attention until 1604, when a certain Jerónimo de Castro wrote a promise to pay Pedro's father for work that Pedro had recently done. After that time, he may have been in Italy until 1607, when he was back in Murcia arranging for the services of a maid. Letters from a later period indicate that he and Angelo Nardi may have become friends while he was there. He was married in Murcia in 1612. By 1616, he was in Valencia, where he painted the monumental "Martyrdom of San Sebastián" at the cathedral. A year later, he was doing similar works at

Toledo Cathedral , native_name_lang = , image = Toledo Cathedral, from Plaza del Ayuntamiento.jpg , imagesize = 300px , imagelink = , imagealt = , landscape = , caption ...

. In the midst of these moves, he stopped in Cuenca and may have taken on Cristóbal García Salmerón as a student.Benito Doménech, Fernando (1987). ''Los Ribalta y la pintura valenciana de su tiempo''. Madrid : Museo del Prado, exhibition catalog. In 1624, he requested admission to the (an agency of the

Inquisition The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...

), but in 1626 he was back in Toledo, where

Alejandro de Loarte Alejandro de Loarte (c.1590/1600 – 12 December 1626) was a Spanish painter, active during the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods. He specialized in still-lifes. Life and work There is very little biographical information available an ...

appointed him an

executor An executor is someone who is responsible for executing, or following through on, an assigned task or duty. The feminine form, executrix, may sometimes be used. Overview An executor is a legal term referring to a person named by the maker of a ...

and he took a student named Juan de Sevilla, son of the sculptor Juan de Sevilla Villaquirán. This was his only officially documented student.Angulo Íñiguez, Diego; Pérez Sánchez, Alfonso E. (1972). ''Pintura toledana de la primera mitad del siglo XVII''. Madrid, Instituto Diego Velázquez, CSIC. While there, he also befriended Jorge Manuel Theotocópuli, the son of

El Greco Domḗnikos Theotokópoulos ( el, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco ("The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. "El G ...

, and became godfather for two of his children. Works he produced during that period include decorations at the

Franciscan The Franciscans are a group of related Mendicant orders, mendicant Christianity, Christian Catholic religious order, religious orders within the Catholic Church. Founded in 1209 by Italian Catholic friar Francis of Assisi, these orders include t ...

convent in Yeste and at the

Buen Retiro Palace Buen Retiro Palace (Spanish: ''Palacio del Buen Retiro'') in Madrid was a large palace complex designed by the architect Alonso Carbonell (c. 1590–1660) and built on the orders of Philip IV of Spain as a secondary residence and place of recrea ...

. In 1630, he charged a "very considerable amount" for a "Birth of Christ" at the .Palomino, Antonio (1988). ''El museo pictórico y escala óptica III. El parnaso español pintoresco laureado''. Madrid : Aguilar S.A. de Ediciones. He was apparently in Toledo until 1632. A letter from the Santo Oficio, related to his application for membership, indicates that he and his wife were living in in 1633. By 1638, he had bought two houses in Murcia. Only one year later, he had moved away again, leaving an altarpiece unfinished. The next available piece of documentary evidence is a will that he made in Valencia in 1645, when he was widowed and childless and very comfortable, financially. He died only two days later. Several artists were profoundly influenced by his style, including

Esteban March Esteban March (c,1610, Valencia - c.1668, Valencia) was a Spanish Baroque painter. Most of what is known about his life comes from writings by Antonio Palomino, who lived slightly later than March. Life and work His works may be compared, styl ...

Pablo Pontons Pablo Pontons (1630 – 1691) was a Spanish Baroque painter, believed to have been a student of Pedro de Orrente, whose style he promoted. Biography He was born in Valencia. His mother was from Murcia and was apparently related to Orrente. Altho ...

and

Mateo Gilarte Mateo Gilarte (c. 1629, Orihuela - 1675, Murcia) was a Spanish Baroque painter. Life and work His father, Francisco, was a gunpowder manufacturer. While still an infant, his family moved to Murcia. He trained as a painter in Valencia, most like ...

Selected works

*''La vuelta al aprisco'', oil on panel (74x89 cm), Museo del Prado, Madrid *''Martyrdom of Saint James the Lesser'', oil on panel (204x158 cm), Museo de Bellas Artes, Valencia *''Saint John the Evangelist in Patmos'', oil on panel (99x131 cm), Museo del Prado *''Saint John the Baptist in the Desert'', oil on panel (142x107 cm), Museo de Santa Cruz, Toledo *''Self-Portrait'', oil on panel (45 x 36 cm), private collection, Madrid, formerly in the collection of Louis-Philippe of Orleans *''Labán da alcance a Jacob'', Museo del Prado, Madrid ***Ecce Homo,Walters Art Museum,Baltimore

References

Antonio Palomino Acislo Antonio Palomino de Castro y Velasco (165513 April 1726) was a Spanish painter of the Baroque period, and a writer on art, author of ''El Museo pictórico y escala óptica'', which contains a large amount of important biographical mate ...

, ''

An account of the lives and works of the most eminent Spanish painters, sculptors and architects ''An account of the lives and works of the most eminent Spanish painters, sculptors and architects'' is a book written by the Spanish painter Antonio Palomino and dedicated to the biographies of the most eminent artists who worked in Spain during t ...

'', 1724, first English translation, 1739, p. 34 *

External links

Pedro Orrente on Artcyclopedia

Pedro Orrente at the Museo del Prado Online Encyclopedia

Pedro Orrente C. by Castro Sanz.

Digital works by Pedro de Orrente
at the Biblioteca Digital Hispánica at the

National Library of Spain National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, c ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Orrente, Pedro 1580 births 1645 deaths People from the Province of Albacete 16th-century Spanish painters Spanish male painters 17th-century Spanish painters Spanish Baroque painters