Exhibition: Maíno’s Adorations: Heaven on Earth

For the first time, two masterpieces by Spanish painter Maíno have gone on display in the UK.

The Spanish painter, Fray Juan Bautista Maíno is an artist of exceptional talent whose name remains largely unfamiliar outside of Spain.

The two paintings, the 'The Adoration of the Shepherds' and 'The Adoration of the Kings' originally formed part of a vast 'retablo' (altarpiece) for the high altar of the church in the Dominican house of San Pedro Mártir in Toledo. Painted from 1612 to 1614, following his return to Spain after an extended stay in Italy, they are among Maíno’s greatest works.

The paintings combine the naturalism of Caravaggio, whose revolutionary paintings Maíno would have seen at first hand in Rome, with the refined palette of Orazio Gentileschi and the more classicising style of Annibale Carracci and Guido Reni, both of whom Maíno knew personally.

Maíno’s two Adorations are significant in the context of Caravaggio’s extended influence across Europe – a subject explored in depth in the concurrent exhibition Beyond Caravaggio.