# A Boy Blowing on an Ember to Light a Candle \(Soplón\)

[View the canonical artwork record](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/a-boy-blowing-on-an-ember-to-light-a-candle-sopln-r2a0840a197cc6c>)

## Artwork

- Artist: [GRECO, El](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f>)
- Date: 1551-1600
- Technique: Oil on canvas, 60,5 x 50,5 cm

## Commentary

The instigator of this painting, representing a boy pursing his fleshy lips to blow on the ember in order to light the black wick of a candle, of which the wax is already melting on account of the heat, may have been Fulvio Orsini, the librarian of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese in whose palace El Greco resided between 1570 and 1572. The title &#39;Soplón&#39; \(Blower\) was given in Jorge Manuel&#39;s inventory. The subject of a boy blowing on an ember appears frequently as a subsidiary element in subject pictures in mid-sixteenth-century Venetian painting.

## Related artworks

- [A Lady in a Fur Wrap](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/a-lady-in-a-fur-wrap-r17bc5af266ec1e>)
- [A Prelate](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/a-prelate-r6752ef04ade0b8>)
- [A View of Toledo \(detail\)](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/a-view-of-toledo-detail-rde83c353dd06aa>)
- [A View of Toledo](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/a-view-of-toledo-rc066c9db2d5956>)
- [Adoration of the Shepherds \(detail\)](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/adoration-of-the-shepherds-detail-r381069254ae37c>)
- [Adoration of the Shepherds](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/adoration-of-the-shepherds-r56f9b10b626e37>)
- [Adoration of the Shepherds](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/adoration-of-the-shepherds-rd06d926a03bd14>)
- [Allegory of the Camaldolese Order](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/allegory-of-the-camaldolese-order-rad53af523c9428>)
- [Altarpiece](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/altarpiece-r3f59efc9f08380>)
- [An Allegory with a Boy Lighting a Candle in the Company of an Ape and a Fool \(Fábula\)](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/an-allegory-with-a-boy-lighting-a-candle-in-the-company-of-an-ape-and-a-fool-fbula-r4b154dc2b33ffa>)
- [An Allegory with a Boy Lighting a Candle in the Company of an Ape and a Fool \(Fábula\)](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/an-allegory-with-a-boy-lighting-a-candle-in-the-company-of-an-ape-and-a-fool-fbula-rb252535edad9f2>)
- [An Allegory with a Boy Lighting a Candle in the Company of an Ape and a Fool \(Fábula\)](<https://beta.wga.hu/artists/greco-el-r8ef3afacca162f/an-allegory-with-a-boy-lighting-a-candle-in-the-company-of-an-ape-and-a-fool-fbula-rf0af40b56bfc85>)

## Attribution

[Web Gallery of Art](<https://beta.wga.hu/pages/about>)