Study for "The Assumption of the Virgin" for San Augustín, Seville

Juan de Valdes Leal (1622-1690) was a Spanish painter known for the dramatic, macabre manner that makes him the most important painter of the Spanish Baroque after Murillo and Zurbaran. The study for The Assumption of the Virgin from c. 1670-72 is a preparatory study for the altarpiece in San Augustin, Seville, in the dramatic, expressive manner that distinguishes Valdes Leal's best religious paintings from the more gentle work of Murillo. The c. 1670-72 date places this in Valdes Leal's most productive period, when he was producing the dramatic religious paintings that are his most accomplished works.

The study for The Assumption of the Virgin is important in the history of Spanish Baroque painting because it demonstrates the dramatic manner that Valdes Leal brought to religious subjects as the most important painter of the Spanish Baroque after Murillo and Zurbaran. Valdes Leal's dramatic manner—combining Baroque energy with Spanish religious intensity—represents an alternative to Murillo's gentler manner in Sevillian painting, and the study shows this dramatic alternative at work in a major commission.

The study for The Assumption of the Virgin is Valdes Leal's dramatic Spanish Baroque: a preparatory study for the Seville altarpiece in the expressive manner of the most important Spanish Baroque painter after Murillo and Zurbaran. The c. 1670-72 study shows the dramatic alternative to Murillo's gentler manner in Sevillian painting.