03 — ARTWORK
In Ictu Oculi
- MEDIUM
- Oil on canvas, 220 x 216 cm
- TYPE
- Still-Life
PALETTE
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THIS REPRODUCTION
- FILE
- 1106 × 1124 px · JPEG
COMMENTARY
UNDERLINED TERMS ARE DEFINED IN THE GLOSSARY.
The Brotherhood of Charity, the Caridad, as it is known, was one of Seville's major lay confraternitiesConfraternities, often called compagnie or, in Venice, scuole, were religious associations of lay persons devoted to specific pious practices or works of charity, often under the direction of, or with the spiritual assistance of, clergy. Guilds 'qua' religious associations had the character of confraternities. Several major historic waves of foundations can be distinguished. (1) Compagnie dei disciplinati or dei laudesi, i.e. flagellant confraternities, which were conformist offshoots of the partly heterodox flagellant movement of 1260. The Venetian scuole grandi were especially prestigious examples. By the 16th century, although flagellant practices were retained in some cases, these functioned more as mutual aid societies and as administrators of charitable funds. (2) Confraternite del Rosario, which spread in the 15th century, being primarily promoted by the Dominicans. (3) A group of confraternities which spread from the mid-15th century, commonly called either Compagnia di S. Girolamo or Compagnia del Divino Amore ('Company of Divine Love'; perhaps the first example was the Florentine Buonuomini di S. Martino), associated with certain specialized charitable enterprises, in the first place relief of the poveri vergognosi or 'shamefaced poor', i.e. respectable people who had to be aided discreetly. In the 16th century they also promoted hospitals of the incurabili, primarily for syphilitics, convents of convertite, i.e. reformed prostitutes, and refuges for maidens. To this movement belonged the famous Roman Company or Oratory of Divine Love, founded c. 1514 in S. Dorotea in Trastevere. This recruited some leading churchmen and papal officials (as a confraternity it was unusual in its heavy clerical membership), but many ascriptions of leading church reformers to it are without sound foundation and there is no basis for its reputation as a seminal body in the Catholic reform movement. The new congregation of the Clerks Regular called Theatines was, however, an offshoot and these took the lead in propagating Compagnie del Divino Amore in Italy. Other types of confraternity were those of the buona morte, which accompanied condemned prisoners, and those which aided imprisoned debtors, e.g. the Florentine Neri. Confraternities commonly had chapels in parish churches or in the churches of religious orders, but sometimes had their own premises, e.g. the splendid ones of the Venetian scuole grandi; in Florence, the hall of Orsanmichele housed a devotional and almsgiving confraternity as well as being a grain dispensary. Great confraternities might exercise public functions: certain Florentine ones concerned with welfare became effectively state magistracies, while the Venetian government, in addition to giving them a ceremonial role, relied upon the scuole grandi to distribute funds. Confraternities, notwithstanding their location, tended to be manifestations of lay piety independent of ecclesiastical institutions, or at least outside the framework of the parish and the diocese.. It was founded in 1565 with the mission of providing a decent burial for paupers. From 1663 the charitable activities were expanded to provide care for the needy sick, and a hospital was built, simultaneously enlarging and renovating the already existing chapela small separate place for worship, either part of a large church or a separate building..
The scheme for the decoration of the chapel is a tripartite exposition of Christian charity as the way of salvation. The first part comprises two memorable paintings by Valdés Leal, demonstrating the futility of earthly pursuits and honours. A life devoted to accumulating wealth, power, and even learning is shown to lead only to the grave. Charity, which constitutes the second part of the program, provides the way to salvation, as seen in the seven acts of mercy, six of which are depicted by Murillo; the seventh, burying the dead, the Caridad's foundation charity, is embodied in a sculptural group, the Entombment of Christ by Pedro Roldán, placed in the altarpieceA picture or sculpture that stands on or is set up behind an altar. The term reredos is used for an ornamental screen or partition, not directly attached to the altar table but affixed to the wall behind it. A diptych is an altarpiece consisting of two panels, a triptych one of three panels, and a polyptych one of four or more panels. From the 14th to 16th century, the altarpiece was one of the most important commissions in European art; it was through the altarpiece that some of the most decisive developments in painting and sculpture came about.. The third component consists of two paintings by Murillo for lateral altars, depicting St Elizabeth of Hungary and St John of God, both illustrating the efficacy of good works and the necessity of personal participation in charitable deeds.
Valdés Leal's relentlessly gruesome paintings are located just inside the entrance, so that visitors to the church must experience the agony of Valdés's Hell before entering the promised land of Murillo's acts of mercy. The first, entitled In Ictu Oculi (In the twinkling of an Eye), is a highly charged representation of the futility of worldly goals and pursuits. The path of glory(1) The supernatural radiance surrounding a holy person. (2) To have the distinction of one's deeds recognized in life and to be revered for them posthumously: this was glory. The nature of true gloria was much discussed, whether it must be connected with the public good, whether the actions that led to it must conform with Christian ethics, how it differed from notoriety. The concept did not exclude religious figures (the title of the church of the Frari in Venice was S. Maria Gloriosa), but it was overwhelmingly seen in terms of secular success and subsequent recognition, as determining the lifestyles of the potent and the form of their commemoration in literature, in portraits and on tombs. As such, it has been taken as a denial of medieval religiosity ('sic transit gloria mundi'), and thus a hallmark of Renaissance individual ism; as a formidable influence on cultural patronage; and as spurring on men of action, as well as writers and artists, to surpass their rivals - including their counterparts in antiquity. lead but to the grave, which is unflinchingly rendered in the companion picture, Finis Gloriae Mundi (The End of Worldly Glory), where vile bugs feast on the rotting remnants of human flesh.
Of all the great painters of the school of Seville - alongside Zurbarán, Velázquez and Murillo - the distinctive style of Valdés Leal is the most difficult to place. Only these two major allegories on the transience of life and on death which he himself is said to have described as "hieroglyphs of our afterlife" have remained truly popular. His patron, Don Miguel de Mañara, was a Knight of the Order of Calatrava who became a benefactor of the brotherhood of the hospital and its church in penitence for his previous life of decadence. The epitaphPictures or tables with reliefs and inscriptions erected in honour of the deceased in churches or sepulchral chapels. on his grave succinctly describes the spirit that commissioned such a powerful vanitasA painting (or element in painting) that acts as a reminder of the inevitabiliry of death, and the pointlessness of earthly ambitions and achievements. Common vanitas-symbols include skulls, guttering candles, hour-glasses and clocks, overturned vessels, and even flowers (which will soon fade). The vanitas theme became popular during the Baroque, with the vanitas still life flourishing in Dutch art. still life: "Here lie the bones and ashes of the worst person who ever lived on earth". His last will and testament contains the most humble self accusation not only as a great sinner, but also as an adulterer, robber and servant of the devil.
The In Ictu Oculi (an allegoryA work of art which represents some abstract quality or idea, either by means of a single figure (personification) or by grouping objects and figures together. Renaissance allegories make frequent allusions both to both Greek and Roman legends and literature, and also to the wealth of Christian allegorical stories and symbols developed during the Middle Ages. of death) presents the triumphWith growing interest from the early 14th century in the history of ancient Rome came a fascination with the city's conquests, the wars by which they were won - and the ceremony which marked their success: the victor's triumph. The knowledge that the privilege of being commemorated by one of these enormous and costly processions of warriors, loot and prisoners was given sparingly, only to the sole commander of a major victory over a foreign army of whom at least 5000 were slain, added to the glamour of the triumph. Its centrepiece was the chariot of the victor himself. Dante gave one to Beatrice in Purgatorio XXIX: 'Rome upon Africanus ne'er conferred / Nor on Augustus's self, a car so brave'. But it was tentatively with the relief carvings on the Triumphal Arch (1452-66) at Castelnuovo in Naples commemorating Alfonso the Magnanimous, and finally with Mantegna's superb Triumph of Caesar cartoons (Hampton Court), that the visual reconstruction of a Roman triumph became complete. Meanwhile, in an age which did not like the idea of large numbers of victory-flushed soldiers parading through its streets, the military triumph became sublimated, as it were, into a number of less controversial forms. This was largely under the influence of Petrarch's 'Trionfi' - poems describing the processions commemorating the triumphs of love, chastity, death; fame, time and eternity. Disseminated soon after his death, they soon appeared in illuminated manuscripts, and the triumph scene became a popular one for woodcuts, decorated marriage chests and other paintings, most beautifully of all on the backs of Piero della Francesca's portraits of Federigo da Montefeltro and his wife, Battista Sforza. Other 'triumphs' were invented: of the seasons, of virtues and of the arts. Nor was the theme allowed to be simply a profane one. Just before his death Savonarola published his 'Triumph of the Cross', in which the reader was invited to imagine 'a four-wheeled chariot on which is seated Christ as Conqueror.' Before it go the apostles, patriarchs and prophets, beside it the army of martyrs, behind it, after 'a countless number of virgins, of both sexes', come the prisoners: 'the serried ranks of the enemies of the Church of Christ.' This aspect of the theme was magnificently realized in Titian's great woodcut 'The Triumph of the Faith'. of the grim reaper, who sweeps into the picture as an imposing figure. One skeletal foot stands on the globe, while the other stands on armaments, the trappings of office and insigniathe distinguishing marks or symbols of state or personal offices or honours. of power. Under his arm, he carries a coffin and in his hand a scythe. As his right hand snuffs out the life-light represented by the candle, he stares at the spectator from the very depths of his empty eye-sockets.
OTHER WORKS BY JUAN DE VALDÉS LEAL
CITE THIS RECORD — BIBTEX
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author = {Krén, Emil and Marx, Daniel},
title = {In Ictu Oculi by VALDÉS LEAL, Juan de},
organization = {{Web Gallery of Art}},
date = {2026-09-13},
url = {https://beta.wga.hu/artists/valds-leal-juan-de-r968beef81fee01/in-ictu-oculi-rffa49b8808d1ee},
urldate = {2026-09-13},
langid = {english}
}ACCESSED 2026-09-13. REPLACE THE AUTHOR FIELD WITH THE COMMENTARY AUTHOR WHERE ONE IS NAMED.