Castilian school; c. 1600.

Castilian school; c. 1600.
"Virgin and Child.
Pine wood carved, gilded and polychrome.
It presents faults and losses on the pictorial surface.
Measurements: 87 x 51 x 21 cm.
Devotional carving of great quality with representation of a Virgin with the Child Jesus seated on her lap. The draping of the mantle and tunic of the Virgin Mary shows a high artistic level, based on natural folds that are able to express the soft qualities of the fabrics. These garments embrace the bodies, rounding the forms in such a way that each figure is endowed with a solid presence. In a perfect balance between solemnity and tenderness. Mary's features, idealized and peaceful, transmit great serenity that harmonizes with the innocent gesture of Jesus.
Spanish sculpture of the time reflects perhaps better than other artistic fields this eagerness to return to the classical Greco-Roman world that exalts the individuality of man in his nudes, creating a new style whose vitality surpasses mere copying. Soon the anatomy, the movement of the figures, the compositions with a sense of perspective and balance, the naturalistic play of the folds, the classical attitudes of the figures began to be valued; but the strong Gothic tradition maintains the expressiveness as a vehicle of the deep spiritualistic sense that informs our best Renaissance sculptures. This strong and healthy tradition favors the continuity of religious sculpture in polychrome wood that accepts the formal beauty offered by Italian Renaissance art with a sense of balance that avoids its predominance over the immaterial content that animates the forms. In the first years of the century, Italian works arrived in our lands and some of our sculptors went to Italy, where they learned first hand the new norms in the most progressive centers of Italian art, whether in Florence or Rome, and even in Naples.