St. Francis Contemplating a Skull

In the 1630s Seville was the richest city in Spain and one of its most anxious, a port where fortunes came off the ships from the Americas while outbreaks of plague were never far away. This tall panel once belonged to an altarpiece in the Carmelite college of Saint Albert in the city, and Zurbaran gives the friars there exactly what they came to look at. Francis of Assisi stands alone in a coarse Capuchin habit, cradling a skull in both hands, thinking about death. Almost nothing else is in the picture. The pointed hood throws his face into deep shadow, the robe falls in straight heavy folds, and a hard light rakes across it from one side. Look down at the very bottom, where the whole dark column of cloth ends in just the tips of two bare toes on the stone.