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The exhibition has been conceived in a simple manner
but our intention was to create a crescendo in the galleries, leading up to a dazzling conclusion.
I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that.
It opens with Maíno as a painter of small-format works, particularly on copper
and in the manner of the great painters working in Rome in that first decade of the 17th century.
We decided to compare Maíno with other artists, particularly Italian ones,
in order to show how well his artistic personality fits into that context
and how the works coexist in an extremely natural way.
After the small coppers the exhibition leads on to a series of extremely fine landscapes,
an aspect of his work that merits particular attention
Maíno was painting landscapes at the same time that the genre was practically being invented as an autonomous one in Rome.
We then reveal his abilities as a great portraitist.
The exhibition includes two small but very important areas devoted to the portrait.
According to contemporaries, and in particular Jusepe Martínez,
who left us the largest amount of accurate information on the artist,
Maíno was very close to the Carracci and to *** Reni, and this is evident in his painting.
Martínez states that “he was one of the great portraitists”, and I think this comes across in the exhibition.
After the portraits we move on to large-format works through the four major canvases
from the Saint Peter Martyr Altarpiece for that church in Toledo and other works used as points of comparison.
Our intention was to make that altarpiece the guiding thread in the first rooms
precisely due to its complexity, revealing as it does Maíno’s skills as a landscape painter and portraitist.
In addition, two of the four major canvases from the altarpiece – the two Adorations -
need singling out for their importance within the history of the Museo del Prado.
For many visitors who have never previously been able to Maíno in such a concentrated and detailed way,
these two works have always been astonishing for their powers of evocation.
This gallery includes what for me is one of the most vivid and striking comparisons,
namely The Adoration of the Shepherds by Maíno,
who had recently arrived in Toledo and who was totally familiar with the most cutting-edge Italian painting of the day,
and next to it, on the same scale and painted just a few months earlier, El Greco’s canvas of the same subject.
I believe that the whole exhibition is justified by this comparison alone.
The exhibition then focuses on other large-scale compositions, some of the importance of Saint Dominic in Soriano,
which is a major loan from the Hermitage, as is the other Adoration of the Shepherds.
The visitor can also see Maíno’s large Pentecost,
which includes the figure of the Magdalen in the foreground:
undoubtedly one of the most beautiful depictions of this figure in the entire history of painting.
Another very striking comparison is the Caravaggio
David with the Head of Goliath from the Prado’s collection and the Maíno loaned from the Museum of Fine Arts in Basel.
The attribution of the latter was debated for more than fifty years, with some favouring Caravaggio and others a Spanish master, probably Maíno.
The last gallery takes the form of a celebration
of The Recapture of Bahía in Brazil,
the painting that most overtly reveals Maíno’s associations with the Court of Philip IV and with the monarch himself.
A controversial work is the portrait of Philip IV from the Metropolitan Museum in New York.
It has been the subject of a lengthy debate as to whether it is by Gaspar de Crayer or Maíno.
The painting is included here with the intention of encouraging further study and debate.
Finally, the exhibition includes the Prado’s version of Saint Dominic in Soriano, which is less dazzling than the other version
but nonetheless extremely beautiful and which includes the motif of a painting within a painting, as we find in The Recapture of Bahía in Brazil.