The ''Cristo Yacente (Dead Christ) of El Pardo'', is a life-size polychromed sculpture by Spanish sculptor
Gregorio Fernández
Gregorio Fernández (April 1576 – 22 January 1636) was a Spanish Baroque sculptor. He belongs to the Castilian school of sculpture, following the style of other great artists like Alonso Berruguete, Juan de Juni, Pompeyo Leoni, and Juan de Ar ...
, executed between 1614 and 1615. Housed in a chapel of the Capuchin Monastery of
El Pardo
El Pardo is a ward (''barrio'') of Madrid belonging to the district of Fuencarral-El Pardo. As of 2008 its population was of 3,656.
History
The ward was first mentioned in 1405 and in 1950 was an autonomous municipality of the Community of Madri ...
(Madrid), the sculpture was commissioned by King
Philip III to celebrate the birth of his son Philip IV.
The ''Cristo yacente of El Pardo'' is the most famous of the fourteen ''"Cristos"'' produced by Fernández and his workshop.
As devotional images, many of them were processed during
Holy Week
Holy Week ( la, Hebdomada Sancta or , ; grc, Ἁγία καὶ Μεγάλη Ἑβδομάς, translit=Hagia kai Megale Hebdomas, lit=Holy and Great Week) is the most sacred week in the liturgical year in Christianity. In Eastern Churches, w ...
with other “
pasos” (elaborate religious floats adorned with sculptures depicting scenes from the Passion of Christ). All these images were created in accordance with
Counter-Reformation ideology that required realism in religious images to impress and move the believer.
Sources
*
{{Refend
* Colón Mendoza, Ilenia. ''The Cristos yacentes of Gregorio Fernández: Polychrome Sculptures of the Supine Christ in Seventeenth-Century Spain''. England: Routledge Publishing, 2015.
External links
Capuchin Monastery of El Pardo
1610s sculptures
Sculptures by Gregorio Fernández
Statues of Jesus
Christian art about death