Le Martyre de saint Maurice

In 1583, Philip II of Spain came back from Portugal to inspect the new paintings for the Escorial, the vast granite monastery-palace he was building outside Madrid. He looked at this one, paid El Greco in full, and then had it taken down and stored away. It never hung on the altar it was made for. What seems to have unsettled the king is right there in the color, the acid greens and cold blues, and in the staging: the elongated soldiers crowd the foreground while the beheading itself, the whole point of the commission, is pushed small into the middle distance. Philip wanted Saint Maurice's martyrdom front and center, in the warm manner of Titian, whom he loved. El Greco gave him a grave conversation among officers about faith instead.