JUANDE MESAY VELASCO Lot n° 20

Juan de Mesa y Velasco was one of the most important sculptors of the Andalusian Baroque. He is considered the most brilliant disciple of Juan Martínez Montañés (Alcalá la Real, Jaén, 1568 - Sevilla, 1649). He entered his workshop at the age of 23 and his artistic personality was eclipsed by that of his master for centuries until the end of the 19th century. He dedicated himself almost exclusively to processional images, carrying out numerous anatomical studies of real human figures, alive and dead, to then capture them in his works with great realism. His nudes reveal a great knowledge of human anatomy, the faces of his figures reflect an intense interior life and the clothes of his characters create intense contrasts of light. We find ourselves before an exempt representation of the triumphant Child Jesus. This iconography originates in Andalusia in the last third of the 16th century, the oldest version being considered the one made around 1582 by Jerónimo Hernández for the Brotherhood of the Fifth Angustia of Seville, although it was undoubtedly the one made by Martínez Montañés, in 1606, for the Sacramental of the Tabernacle of the Sevillian Cathedral, the most successful piece. In this last one, his disciple Juan de Mesa would have been inspired in a direct way at the time of executing the different versions that at the present time are supposed exits of his gouge. The Cordovan sculptor will configure a physiognomy different to that of his master based on the corpulence of his anatomy, the volumetry of the head and the compositional movement. It is a sculpture of round bulge made of carved and polychromed wood. The Child Jesus appears naked to dress. It is very realistic in the treatment of the body, more opulent and more rounded lines as would correspond to those of a child, and also more baroque than those of mountaineers, which on the contrary is somewhat stylized line and perhaps more classicist canons. He rests the weight