Pedro Berruguete
gigatos | June 9, 2022
Summary
Pedro Berruguete (Paredes de Nava, Palencia c. 1450 -Madrid? 1503) was a Spanish painter, situated in the transition from the Gothic style to Renaissance painting.
After his training, probably with Fernando Gallego in Salamanca, he would have traveled very young to Italy, where “Pietro Spagnuolo” is documented working under the patronage of the Duke of Urbino, Federico de Montefeltro. This Italian stay would have allowed him to meet the main artists of the Quattrocento, such as Melozzo da Forlì, and to learn Renaissance techniques and manners, such as the mastery of space, anatomy or the variety and naturalness of gestures, as well as the architectural and decorative elements of the Renaissance, although on his return to Castile, around 1483, these characteristics were not so evident in his painting.
He was the father of one of the most outstanding artists of the Hispanic Renaissance, Alonso Berruguete.
Pedro Berruguete was born in Castile and his early works reveal this origin and his attachment to the gothic modes that predominated in the art of the time. His artistic apprenticeship is quite unknown. His trip to Italy to work in the Ducal Palace of Urbino, where he would have coincided with the Flemish Joos van Wassenhove (Justus of Ghent), also raises many questions. The mention of a “Pietro Spagnuolo pittore” working in Urbino in 1477, made that, since 1927, the so-called one was identified with Pedro Berruguete, supposing an Italian formation and stay of the painter that is not accepted by all the critics. Those who affirm the trip to Italy attribute to him there a series of portraits such as that of Pope Sixtus IV (Louvre Museum), and the Portrait of Federico de Montefeltro and his son Guidobaldo (Urbino, Ducal Palace), as well as collaborating in works by other authors, such as Piero della Francesca.
However, the oldest testimony of the presence of a Spanish painter at the court of Urbino, besides the aforementioned document of 1477, is found in the work of Pablo de Céspedes, who in his Discurso de la comparación de la antigua y moderna pintura y escultura, written in Córdoba in 1604, establishes a clear difference between “Berruguete el viejo, padre de Berruguete” and “otro español que en el palacio de Urbino, en un camarino del duque, pintto unas cabezas a manera de retratos de hombres famosos, buenas a maravilla”. After his presumed Italian stay, Berruguete would have returned to Castile, where he found a good clientele in the ecclesiastical establishment, focusing his production on paintings for altarpieces.
What is certain is that in 1478, only one year after being mentioned in Urbino as “Pietro Spagnuolo” and four years before the probable date of the portrait of Federico de Montefeltro, Pedro Berruguete married in Paredes de Nava, dating his panels of Santa María del Campo in the same year.
According to Ceán Bermúdez Berruguete is documented in Toledo in 1483, where he decorated the walls of the old tabernacle chapel of the Cathedral, although the surviving documentation refers rather to the year 1493. After what would have been a first stay in Toledo he would have returned to his hometown and executed the altarpiece of St. Anne and the Virgin (1485-1488). At this date he would have returned to Toledo and, after a period of documentary silence, he is found there again in 1494. Commissioned by the inquisitor Tomás de Torquemada, he made the main altarpiece of the Monastery of Santo Tomás de Ávila. Dismembered, the painting of the Auto de Fe presided over by Santo Domingo de Guzmán, preserved with other panels of the altarpiece in the Prado Museum, stands out.
There is a possibility that the painter worked in the service of Isabella the Catholic. One of the royal commissions was the Saint John the Evangelist in Patmos, which Berruguete delivered on May 3, 1499 in the old Alcázar of Madrid and which today is preserved in the Royal Chapel of Granada.
Around 1500 he worked for the Hospital de la Latina in Madrid, at the request of Beatriz Galindo, founder of this institution and tutor to Queen Isabella. One of his most successful works, The Virgin and Child on a Throne, presided over the chapel of the hospital until its demolition in 1906, and was later transferred to the Museum of History of Madrid (it is currently deposited in the Prado Museum).
His last stage was spent in his hometown, Paredes de Nava, where he painted works such as the partially disappeared altarpiece of Guaza de Campos from 1501. In his painting the influence of the Italian Renaissance stands out, in the fact of wanting to frame the figures and actions in space, through the use of light and perspective, although sometimes not well resolved. On his return to Castile, he would have lost interest in detail and his figures became more sober, perhaps as an adaptation of his style to the more archaic tastes of his patrons.
Also read, biographies – Sarojini Naidu
First stage
First stage (between 1470 and 1471): Verification of the cross of Christ from the church of San Juan de Paredes de Nava or the Adoration of the Magi from the Várez Fisa collection.
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Second stage
Second stage and supposed apprenticeship trip to Italy (1471-1483).not too many testimonies of Berruguete”s work are preserved at this time, and those that exist are controversial as to authorship. The Portrait of Federico de Montefeltro and his son Guidobaldo (Galleria delle Marche, Ducal Palace of Urbino), an excellent and original example of a “device” portrait in an interior; and the series of Illustrious Men, distributed among several museums, including the Louvre, stand out above all. This Italian stay would have been interrupted by a return trip to Paredes de Nava in 1478 to get married, returning to Italy.
Also read, biographies – Josephus
Third stage
Third stage (1483-1503) of creation in Castile. At this time he adapted the style he learned in Italy to the tastes of the Castilian clientele, more conservative and attached to the ways of the Gothic.
His masterpiece is a series of paintings representing the Kings of Judah, in the main altarpiece of the church of Santa Eulalia de Paredes de Nava, where despite resorting to archaizing elements (frontal composition, gilded background), he achieves a gallery of portraits of intense verism. King David, with his penetrating gaze, King Solomon and King Hezekiah stand out in the series.
Many of his best works from this and other periods can be seen in different locations in the province of Palencia, such as The Adoration of the Kings and The Annunciation, kept in the Parish Museum of Santa María de Becerril de Campos, The Suitors of the Virgin and The Crucifixion, kept in the Diocesan Museum of Palencia, or The Lamentation over the Body of Christ in the Cathedral of Palencia.
In the church of the Assumption of Santa Maria del Campo, in Burgos, two important works of this period are preserved: Decapitation of the Baptist and Baptism of Christ, which were part of an altarpiece of the life of the Baptist, dated between 1483 and 1485, being one of the first works of this third Castilian stage. The innovations in composition and perspective brought from Italy are evident in these two works. In the Decapitation, he uses as a background an architecture inspired by what Francesco Laurana was doing at that time in Urbino.
The Annunciation of the Carthusian Monastery of Miraflores stands out for the detail in the objects and the interesting play of perspectives, which creates a perfect spatial illusion. In all these works the figures appear very individualized, and the mastery of space, perspective and composition is enriched with an accurate sense of drawing and a wise use of color.
His last commission was the main altarpiece of the cathedral of Avila, which he was unable to complete due to his death. He painted for this work, of late Gothic architecture, several panels with stories of the life of Christ for the body of the altarpiece, and figures of patriarchs for the predella. In these paintings, perhaps at the request of the commissioners, he conforms to the gothic schemes that prevailed in Castile at that time, using the gold background and somewhat rigid compositions. The figures are of a more robust and monumental canon than in previous works, perhaps so that they would stand out in the remoteness of the main chapel. The death of the master meant that the altarpiece was completed by Juan de Borgoña.
In 2003, on the occasion of the commemoration of the fifth centenary of the painter”s death, a monographic exhibition was dedicated to him in his native town, Paredes de Nava, which brought together the best of his painting and shed light on some aspects of his life and work.
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