“View of Toledo” is one of the most famous paintings by the Spanish artist El Greco. The canvas is unique: this is one of the two surviving landscapes of the master. Until the 16th century, landscape was not considered an independent genre in European art. The image of nature was only a background. “View of Toledo” was also considered a sketch or part of another El Greco canvas for a long time, but in the end, the researchers decided that it was an independent work.
about the author
El Greco was a Greek by birth (hence the nickname), a native of Crete. He worked at the turn of the XVI-XVII centuries in Spain. At the beginning of his career, the artist studied icon painting, which is very noticeable in his works. At home, he painted the first paintings - “The Annunciation”, “Christ Healing the Blind.” At 26, El Greco left Crete and went first to Italy, and then to Spain, in the service of King Philip II.
The style of the master took shape quite early. Despite the fact that El Greco studied painting in the workshop of Titian, his writing technique is unique to his time. His works are among the best examples of Spanish Baroque. Despite its popularity, during his lifetime the artist did not have followers and imitators.
The canvas "Burial of Count Orgas" quickly brought fame to the artist. He became a successful court painter and worked on portraits and government orders until the end of his life. In Spain, El Greco lived and died in Toledo. He depicted this city in one of his extremely small landscapes.
Artistic analysis of the picture
Under a stormy sky, urban buildings spread out on canvas. The artist here is quite fluent in kind. He partially shifted the location of buildings, some conceived. In the foreground is the Alcantra Bridge. Alcazar Palace and Toledo Cathedral rise on a hill . In fact, in life, the bell tower of the cathedral is hidden behind the castle, but the artist pushed it out from the wall. On the left you can see the castle of San Servando. We can’t talk about the photographic accuracy of the landscape, but the name “Toledo’s spiritual portrait” was assigned to it.
The viewer looks at the city from below, this made it possible to raise the horizon and vertically stretch the proportions, which is generally characteristic of El Greco's work. The picture is conditionally divided into two parts: the city and green hills, flooded with fantastic lighting, below and a dramatic stormy sky from above. Such sky and lighting are found in other paintings of the artist. Bright colors and fantastic lighting make the drama of the “View of Toledo” dramatic. El Greco does not document the architecture and landscape with the accuracy of a cartographer, but depicts the most characteristic features, his impression of the city.
History of the painting
The canvas "View of Toledo" was hardly written to order, rather, it can be attributed to one of the experiments of the master. Until the end of the 17th century, the painting was in the collection of the Spanish counts de Acover. In the XVIII and XIX centuries, most likely, it was stored in the Augustinian monastery. In 1907 it was acquired by the French collector Duran-Ruelle, and later transferred to the American Hevemeyer. In the end, along with the rest of his collection, “View of Toledo” ended up in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.