São Francisco de Assis Recebendo os Estigmas

Tiepolo was the most sought-after ceiling painter in Europe, and he was near the end. In 1762 the king of Spain, Charles III, had lured him from Venice to Madrid to decorate the royal palace, and in 1767 came this commission: altarpieces for a new Franciscan church at Aranjuez, the royal town south of the capital. The subject is a miracle from 1224 — Saint Francis, alone on a mountain in prayer, receiving the stigmata, the five wounds of the crucified Christ opening on his own body as an angel appears above him. But taste at the Spanish court was already turning against everything Tiepolo stood for. A cooler, harder, more classical style was coming in, and its champion, the painter Mengs, had the king's ear. Tiepolo died in Madrid in 1770 before this picture was ever hung. Within months it was taken down and replaced with a newer altarpiece, and his canvas was carried off to a convent, ending up, generations later, in the Prado.