Page 170 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

Alonso Berruguete was hardly alone among
Spanish sculptors of his generation in adopting
the aesthetics of the Italian Renaissance, but he
was the only Spanish sculptor able to imbue those
classical, idealized forms with a spiritual passion
as intense as that of his Gothic forebears. The Sac-
rifice of Isaac shows Berruguete's sources, his
inspiration from Donatello's late works, Michel-
angelo, and the sculpture of the Laocoon, which
was discovered in Rome during his Italian so-
journ. In terms of sheer emotional impact, Alonso
Berruguete's sculpture recalls the late work cre-
ated by Michelangelo after Berruguete left Italy
for Spain.
The sculpture represents the moment when
Abraham is about to slay his own son as an offer-
ing to his God, just before the angel stays his hand
(Genesis 22). Berruguete has combined with great
sensitivity the physical beauty of Isaac and his
palpable fear with his father's ambivalent stance
and yearning. These elements, bound within a
highly compressed composition, express the pas-
sion and agony of Abraham's faith.
Berruguete remained active throughout the
remainder of his career. In 1529 he provided
sculpture and paintings for the altarpiece of the
Colegio de Fonseca in Salamanca. Major works of
the 15305 include altarpieces for the churches of
Santiago in Valladolid, and Santa Ursula in Toledo,
as well as some of the choirstalls in the Cathedral
of Toledo. When Bigamy died in 1543, the com-
missions for the throne of the Archbishop of
Toledo and for the huge alabaster Transfiguration
in the choir went to Alonso Berruguete. In 1554
he began the sepulcher of Cardinal Tavera, mod-
eled after that of Cardinal Cisneros in Alcala de
Henares by Bartolome Ordonez. Berruguete died
in 1561. s.s.

52
"ADMIRAL" HERALDIC CARPET

c. 1429-1473
Hispano-Moresque
wool, Spanish knotting
4
581 X 267 (228 /5 X 10^/8)
references: Faraday 1929, 23; Ellis 1988, 247
Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Joseph Lees
Williams Memorial Collection

Rug weaving, a craft brought to Spain by the
Moors, became an important industry there in
the twelfth century. Some of the oldest carpets
in existence today were manufactured in Spain.
When Queen Eleanor of Castile traveled to En-
The disassembled altarpiece is now exhibited in (estofada sobre oro). The Sacrifice of Isaac was gland in the late thirteenth century, she brought
the Museo Nacional de Escultura. The contract placed in a niche at the lower left of the altarpiece, back carpets from Cordoba and Granada that pro-
for the altarpiece specified a mixture of paintings where its considerable energy must have seemed voked much interest, because rugs were hardly
and sculpture, with the latter gilded, then painted only barely contained. known in England at that time (Faraday 1929, 23).

EUROPE AND THE MEDITERRANEAN WORLD 169