Title

Antonio del Río and his sons. Detail from a triptych

Key, Adriaen Thomasz [attributed to] (?, ca. 1544 - Antwerp, post. 1589)

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Object history

Antonio del Río, an advisor to Philip II, commissioned a triptych consisting of a central panel—whose current whereabouts are unknown—depicting the coming of the Holy Spirit, and two side panels featuring portraits of the donors and their children accompanied by religious scenes: the Resurrection of Christ and the Ascension (Estella, 1996; Jonckheere, 2007).

The triptych was initially installed around 1569–1570 in the church of Aartselaar (Belgium); however, a few years later, between 1576 and 1580, it was moved by del Río first to Lisbon (Portugal) and then to Burgos (Spain). The reasons for this movement of artworks lie in the iconoclastic revolts, orbeeldenstorm (Díaz, 2010). This situation led to a large number of paintings from Flanders beginning to arrive in Spain during the second half of the 16th century (Jonckheere and Suykerbuyk, 2012; Diéguez, 2019). Antonio del Río, a native of Lisbon, had drawn up his will in that same city in 1584. In it, he referred to the triptych and requested that it be placed in the Chapel of the Resurrection at the Convent of the Holy Trinity in Burgos, a church of which his family had been patrons:

“In the church of Aertselaer I had placed an altarpiece dedicated to the Holy Spirit... very large, and on the central panel is the dedication to the Holy Spirit, and on one of the doors I am portrayed with my children in life-size portraits alongside the dedication to the Most Holy Resurrection, and on the other is a life-size portrait of Doña Leonor López de Villanoba, my beloved wife, with the dedication of the Ascension of Our Lord... and since, during the destruction of that church, they saved that altarpiece for me and sent it here to Lisbon—where I currently have it packed in four boxes—and because that altarpiece is of excellent workmanship and worthy of preservation, and since it cost me a great deal of money, I order that be sent to Burgos and that my heir place it in the Chapel of the Resurrection”(National Historical Archive. Clergy Section, Burgos, Trinitarians. File 1017; Estella, 1996).

Antonio Ponz visited the convent in the 18th century, and among the works he described was this one:

“The Descent of the Holy Spirit has doors featuring portraits of kneeling figures, all executed in the Flemish style, and a plaque below reads that it was commissioned at his own expense by Antonio del Río, Lord of Cleidale and Aertselaer, near Antwerp”(Ponz, 1788).

During the War of Independence, General Jean-Barthélemy Darmagnac (1766–1855) acquired a large art collection by looting churches and monasteries. Notable among these are the paintings from the Miraflores Charterhouse (Miraflores Triptych, Annunciation, Presentation of Christ in the Temple, Nativity, Adoration of the Magi, Birth of Saint John the Baptist, Beheading of Saint John the Baptist, Revenge of Herodias, and Ecce Agnus Dei) and the Virgin between Saint James and Saint Dominic, attributed to Jacques Floreins. In a letter he wrote to the Ministry of the Interior on January 25, 1809, Gutiérrez de Arce described the difficulties Darmagnac had caused him in taking inventory of the assets that had been removed from the libraries and suppressed convents (Antigüedad del Castillo, 1989). In it, he mentioned fourteen paintings that had been removed from Burgos, this being one of them:

“The two panels from another painting depicting the descent of the Holy Spirit, which was in the cloister of the Trinity and is currently in San Gerónimo; and the panels containing several portraits in the style of Dürer but of great merit—these are the ones taken by Governor Mr. Darmagnac”(Simancas Archive. Gracia y Justicia, leg. 1247; *Antigüedad del Castillo*, 1989).

Before his death, Darmagnac gradually sold off part of his collection; however, in this case, it is unknown whether he himself negotiated the sale with the Count of Duchâtel (1803–1867) or whether the general’s heirs were responsible. Tanneguy Duchâtel’s widow bequeathed the two side panels of the triptych to the Louvre Museum in 1878, reserving the right of use for her children, who later renounced this right. Both works are currently housed at that institution.

Description

This panel corresponds to the left wing of the triptych. It depicts Antonio del Río, an advisor to Philip II, and his two sons. In the background, there is an allusion to the Resurrection of Christ; however, as was the case with the panel depicting his wife, the figure of Jesus does not appear in the panel. Jonckheere (2007) has interpreted this peculiarity as a sign of crypto-Calvinism. However, this interpretation is questionable, since the triptych was dismantled in the early 19th century and its central panel is missing, making it impossible to know how the scene was originally presented. Furthermore, Antonio del Río was Catholic and did not subscribe to Protestant ideas. The panel was attributed to Adriaen Thomasz Key based on a stylistic comparison with other panels by the artist (Friedländer, 1936; Jonckheere, 2007). It is one of Key’s earliest works, which has led to the suggestion that the triptych was actually commissioned from Willem Key and, following his death, Adriaen Thomasz took over the commission.

Locations

• ca. 1584 - ca. 1808

  convent

  Convent of the Trinity, Burgos, Burgos (Spain)

• ca. 1808

  plunder

  Jean-Barthélemy Darmagnac, Burdeos (France)

• Mid XIX^th c. - Third quarter of the XIX^th c.

  private collection

  Tanneguy Duchâtel, Duchâtel Count, Paris (France) *

• 1878 - present

  museum

  Louvre Museum, Paris (France)