Novo-Hispanic school; XVIII century.

Novo-Hispanic school; XVIII century.
"Vera effigie de la Virgen del Peral".
Oil on panel.
Measurements: 56 x 44.5 cm; 73 x 62 cm (frame).
The work shows the Virgin with the Child, seated on the top of a pear tree, which is inscribed in an architectural niche. On an indeterminate background, the image of a monumental Virgin Mary holds the Child with one of her arms and with the other hand a pear. It was very common in the 17th century to dress the most venerated images in this way in order to respect and update them at the same time, as well as to highlight them and add to them the richness that their "rank" of sacred character requires. The elements carried by both Mary and the Child, and the gestures of both are very reminiscent of the image of the so-called Virgen del Peral.
Given the importance given to religious images in the Hispanic world, during the 18th and 19th centuries ambitious pictorial series and extensive iconographic programs were created for churches and convents, as well as printed prints, medals and reliquaries for private devotion. As a whole, regardless of their size or support, these images fulfilled the objective of sacralizing daily life beyond the altars. Among this wide repertoire we would like to point out those painted replicas of a certain devotional sculpture, either of a Christ or of a Virgin, which technically recreate their original location as well as showing the figure in question. These painted copies received the name of "true portraits" or vera efigie, an artistic phenomenon of prolific production in the viceroyalty of New Spain and the European metropolis; they are canvases painted in oil, with great detail and realistic intention. These paintings were intended for those who contemplated them to believe they were in the presence of the same effigy. In a historical sense, we understand the painted replicas as a means of affective substitution of religious sentiment in the absence of the original sculpture.