(Mascaraque, Toledo circa 1510–1566)
The Apparition of Christ to Saint Peter Martyr,
tempera on panel, 46.5 x 37.5 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private collection, Madrid;
sale, Ansorena, Madrid, 6 March 2013, lot 435;
where acquired by the present owner

Literature:
I. Mateo Gómez, Una Inusual iconografia de San Pedro Mártir en una table de Juan Correa de Vivar, in: Archivio español de arte, no. 336, 2011, pp. 390–394 (as Juan Correa de Vivar)

This small panel represents Christ carrying the cross while turning to look at a Dominican monk shown kneeling in prayer outside the entrance to a monastery behind him. According to Mateo Gómez (see literature) the iconography of this scene derives from the apocryphal episode of the Quo Vadis whereby Saint Peter the Apostle is replaced in the present painting by the Dominican martyr, Saint Peter of Verona.

It is possible that the Dominican monk represented on the right of the present panel is a portrait, given the individual characterisation of his features and his lack of a halo. Saint Peter of Verona was a preacher of the Dominican Order, so the present painting, given its dimensions, may have been made for the private devotion of a Dominican friar, who perhaps supplied the artist with this unusual iconography involving Saint Peter Martyr and based on the Golden Legend by the Dominican Jacopo da Varagine (circa 1230-1298) of which several manuscript copies exist in Spain, one of which is conserved in the Palazzo Reale, Madrid, and is dated 1452.

This small painting is a work by Juan Correa de Vivar and it has been dated to 1535-1545 by Isabel Mateo Gómez (see literature). The artist’s typical representation of figures during this period are imbued with a rhythmic movement, reminiscent of mannerism. The figure of Christ in movement is typical of Correa’s style and the positioning of his feet can be compared with those of the Angel in the artist’s Annunciation of 1559 in the Prado, Madrid (inv. no. P002828). A similar rendering of movement can be seen in the female figure in the San Marco panel by Alonso Berruguete from 1526 conserved in the Museo Nacional de Escultura, Palacio de Villena, Valladolid (inv. no. A1 conjunto). The model for the head of Christ is the same as that used by Correa in the Saint Martin giving his cloak to a poor man from the Monastery of San Martin de Valdeiglesias, now in the Prado, Madrid.

In Juan Correa de Vivar’s paintings of this period, as in the present work, columns of green or red stone set in striking contrast to the white walls of the surrounding buildings are frequently represented; this can also be seen in his Adoration of the Magi made for the church of Nostra Signora dell’Assunzione, Meco, Madrid. Moreover, in the present painting the artist’s careful attention to the depiction of architecture and the construction of pictorial space can be compared with the Saint Peter healing the paralytic man in the Museo Municipal de Málaga (inv. no. P676).

Juan Correa de Vivar was the leading artist in mid-sixteenth century Toledo. He probably trained with Juan de Borgoña from 1527, and he collaborated with other Toledan painters such as Pedro de Cisneros and Francisco Comontes. The influence of de Borgoña is most apparent in Correa’s early work, especially in his compositional arrangements, his figure types and his attention to drawing: this is demonstrated by works such as his Altarpiece of the Nativity for the Monastery of San Jerónimo de Guisando (El Tiemblo). Juan Correa de Vivar was significantly influenced by Raphael and his circle; subsequently he became more inspired by the the emergent formal tradition of the Roman mannerists. Correa was apt to draw from a wide range of sources for his figure groups and compositions, therefore it is not unusual to find both modern and archaic elements in his paintings.