Murillo Painting the Virgin in the Franciscan Convent at Seville

The British artist John Frederick Lewis painted some of the most sophisticated watercolors ever produced. This elaborate example was executed in Paris during the winter of 1838. A well-traveled artist, Lewis had closely studied the paintings of Bartolomé Estebán Murillo (1617–1682) during a visit to Spain in 1832. However, the curious composition of Murillo Painting the Virgin was almost certainly suggested by Horace Vernet’s Raphael at the Vatican, a work that aroused considerable interest at the 1833 Paris Salon and one Lewis surely examined. He may have intended his own painting as a tribute to the Spanish artist, a challenge to the Frenchman Vernet, or a topical response to the excitement caused in Paris in 1838 when the Galerie Espagnole opened in the Louvre. The representation of old masters at work had a long tradition, and the depiction of a Spanish master would have been timely in 1838.