Acislo Antonio Palomino de Castro y Velasco (165513 April 1726) was a Spanish painter of the

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 ...

period, and a writer on art, author of ''El Museo pictórico y escala óptica'', which contains a large amount of important biographical material on Spanish artists.

Life

Antonio Palomino was born to a respectable family at

Bujalance Bujalance is a town located in the heart of Andalucia, southern Spain, in the province of Córdoba. , it had 7910 inhabitants. Its name is derived from the Arabic term ''Burj al-Hansh''. Among its monuments and places of interest are the Mooris ...

, near Córdoba in 1655. He studied

philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. ...

theology Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing th ...

and law at Córdoba, and had lessons in painting from Juan de Valdés Leal, who visited there in 1672, and afterwards from Juan de Alfaro y Gamez in 1675. After taking

minor orders Minor orders are ranks of church ministry. In the Catholic Church, the predominating Latin Church formerly distinguished between the major orders —priest (including bishop), deacon and subdeacon—and four minor orders—acolyte, exorcist, lec ...

Palomino moved to

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 ...

in 1678, where he associated with Alfaro,

Claudio Coello Claudio Coello (2 March 1642 – 20 April 1693) was a Spanish Baroque painter. Coello is considered the last great Spanish painter of the 17th century. The son of Faustino Coello, a famous Portuguese sculptor, he was a court painter for Charle ...

, and

Juan Carreño de Miranda Juan Carreño de Miranda (25 March 1614 — 3 October 1685) was a Spanish painter of the Baroque period. Biography Born in Avilés in Asturias, son of a painter with the same name, Juan Carreño de Miranda. His family moved to Madrid in 1623, a ...

, and executed some indifferent

fresco Fresco (plural ''frescos'' or ''frescoes'') is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plast ...

es. He soon afterwards married a lady of rank, and, having been appointed ''

alcalde Alcalde (; ) is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An ''alcalde'' was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian '' cabildo'' (the municipal council) ...

'' of the ''

mesta The ''Mesta'' () was a powerful association protecting livestock owners and their animals in the Crown of Castile that was incorporated in the 13th century and was dissolved in 1836. Although best known for its organisation of the annual migra ...

'', was himself ennobled; in 1688 he was appointed painter to King Charles II. The artist visited

Valencia Valencia ( va, València) is the capital of the autonomous community of Valencia and the third-most populated municipality in Spain, with 791,413 inhabitants. It is also the capital of the province of the same name. The wider urban area al ...

in 1697, and remained there for three or four years, again devoting himself to fresco painting, including the ceilings of the church of the Santos Juanes. Between 1705 and 1715 he spent considerable amounts of time in

Salamanca Salamanca () is a city in western Spain and is the capital of the Province of Salamanca in the autonomous community of Castile and León. The city lies on several rolling hills by the Tormes River. Its Old City was declared a UNESCO World Herit ...

Granada Granada (,, DIN: ; grc, Ἐλιβύργη, Elibýrgē; la, Illiberis or . ) is the capital city of the province of Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Granada is located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountains, at the c ...

and Córdoba; in the latter year the first volume of his work on art, ''El Museo pictórico y escala óptica'', appeared in Madrid. He painted the ceiling fresco in the dome of the sacristy of the

Cartuja de Granada Granada Charterhouse ( es, Cartuja de Granada) is a Carthusian monastery in Granada, Spain. It is one of the finest examples of Spanish Baroque architecture. The charterhouse was founded in 1506; construction started ten years later, and contin ...

. After the death of his wife in 1725 Palomino took priest's orders. He died on 13 August 1726.

''El Museo pictórico y escala óptica''

Palomino's ''El Museo pictórico y escala óptica'' first appeared in 1715–24 in a three-volume

folio The term "folio" (), has three interconnected but distinct meanings in the world of books and printing: first, it is a term for a common method of arranging sheets of paper into book form, folding the sheet only once, and a term for a book ma ...

edition. The first two parts, on the theory and practice of the art of painting, have had little influence. The third, subtitled ''El Parnaso español pintoresco laureado'', contains a large amount of important biographical material relating to Spanish artists, which, despite its uneven style, has led to the author being called "the Spanish

Vasari Giorgio Vasari (, also , ; 30 July 1511 – 27 June 1574) was an Italian Renaissance Master, who worked as a painter, architect, engineer, writer, and historian, who is best known for his work ''The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculpt ...

" . It was partially translated into English in 1739 as '' An account of the lives and works of the most eminent Spanish painters, sculptors and architects''; an abridgment of the original (''Las Vidas de los pintores y estatuarios españoles'') was published in London in 1742, and appeared in a

French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...

translation in 1749. A

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

version was published at

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label= Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...

in 1781, and a reprint of the entire work at Madrid in 1797. A modern English translation of the abridgment by Nina Ayala Mallory came out in 1987 from Cambridge University Press ().

References

External links

Las vidas de los pintores y estatuarios eminentes españoles, que con sus heroycas obras, han ilustrado la nacion (Spanish version, published in London in 1742)An account of the lives and works of the most eminent Spanish painters, sculptors and architects, tr. (by U. Price) from the Musæum pictorium (English version, 1739)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Palomino, Aciscolo Antonio 1655 births 1726 deaths People from the Province of Córdoba (Spain) Spanish Baroque painters 17th-century Spanish painters Spanish male painters 18th-century Spanish painters 18th-century Spanish male artists Artist authors Spanish art historians Catholic painters