Die Schlacht von Lepanto

In 1887 the Spanish Senate hung this enormous canvas of a naval battle from 1571, the day a Christian coalition known as the Holy League smashed the Ottoman fleet in the Gulf of Patras. What made the choice pointed was the painter. Juan Luna was Filipino, a subject of the same empire, and Spain had just denied his earlier masterpiece its top prize. This commission was partly a way to make that up to him. He set the picture beside Francisco Pradilla's Surrender of Granada, so two of Spain's proudest moments faced each other across the hall. At the center Don Juan of Austria fights at the prow of his galley. The widowed queen regent, María Cristina, unveiled it that November.