Sainte Cécile

Poussin was a Frenchman making his name in Rome in the 1630s, steeping himself in Raphael and ancient sculpture, and you can feel both in this calm, balanced scene. Cecilia, an early Roman martyr, had by his day become the patron saint of music, so he seats her at a keyboard that rests on a carved stone pedestal, reading from a score that two small angels hold up for her. Behind, two young singers follow their own sheet. Nothing certain is known of the painting before 1734, when it appears in the inventory of the royal Alcazar palace in Madrid, probably bought for the Spanish crown by Philip V, who collected Poussin on the European market. It has stayed in Spain ever since.