Pedro Ruiz González (c. 1638/42 - 1706)
Immaculate Conception

Immaculate Conception
Oil on canvas. 175 x 125,5 cm.

Signed and dated lower left: "R.euiz. / Gonzalez. / F.º 1685." With frame in carved and gilded wood from the 19th century.

Provenance:

First, unknown; Madrid, private collection; Madrid, Alcalá Subastas 2000, p. 39, lot 58; private collection.

Exhibitions:

Pedro Ruiz González (h. 1638/1642 - 1706). Pintor barroco madrileño. Madrid, Conde Duque Cultural Center. Curator: Fernando López Sánchez. Scientific adviser: Alfonso E. Pérez Sánchez. From June 5 to July 22, 2007. Juan de Villanueva Hall. Area of Government of the Arts. Madrid City Hall, pp. 40-41, 98 and 139-140, cat. XI.

The image of Mary appears in this painting according to the description of St. John the Apostle "clothed with the sun and with the moon under her feet and on her head a crown of twelve stars" (Apocalypse 12, 1). Ruiz Gonzalez incorporates around her a dozen figures between angels and cherubs arranged in groups of two and three components that accompany the Virgin. The angels below carry a simplification of Marian symbols: three on the left, with the roses of Jericho (Ecclesiasticus 24:18), the spotless mirror (Wisdom 7:26) and the lilies of Sharon (Song of Songs 2:1); two on the right, one offers an attribute to Mary while holding the palm tree of Kadesh (Ecclesiasticus 24:18) and the other treads on the dragon (Revelation 12:3-4) who with the apple of Original Sin in his mouth signifies the definitive victory of the Virgin over this evil.

The painting is signed and dated 1685, the year of the death of Juan Carreño de Miranda, the painter's second master. The model of the Virgin is related to the Immaculate Conception painted by Juan Antonio de Frias y Escalante in 1663, his first master, now in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest. From this model seems to be inspired by the spatial and anatomical situation of the Virgin, along with the movement and folds of her clothing. From Escalante, he derives the position of the evil one in the lower right corner of the canvas, which appears in the Budapest work as well as in the present one. He also adopts from his master, with compositional variants, the figure of the angel that appears in profile in the opposite lower corner and holds the mirror.

This painting was part of the exhibition commemorating the third centenary of the artist's death, which was scientifically advised and presented by Alfonso E. Pérez Sánchez and curated by F. López Sánchez.

Medidas:

125.5 x 175 cm