Friar Martín de Vizcaya Giving Alms

Zurbarán painted this in 1639 for the sacristy of the monastery at Guadalupe, in the hills of Extremadura, and it is still hanging there. That is unusual. Most of his great religious cycles were broken up and scattered across museums centuries ago, but the eight canvases he made for these monks between 1638 and 1647 never left the room they were painted for. The man shown is Fray Martín de Vizcaya, a lay brother who kept the monastery door and handed out bread to the poor who came to it. Guadalupe was a place of pilgrimage and also of practical charity, running a hospital and feeding travellers, and this is a portrait of that daily work rather than a miracle. Look at the basket of loaves. Zurbarán gives it the same careful, raking light he gave to saints, so a pile of ordinary bread becomes the brightest thing in the picture.