Vista e Planta de Toledo

This is El Greco near the end of his life, around 1610, painting the city that had adopted him some 30 years earlier. It is part townscape, part map. A young man, thought to be the painter's son Jorge Manuel, kneels in the corner holding out a street plan of Toledo. What makes it strange is the building floating on a cloud at the top. That is the Tavera hospital, and El Greco lifted it into the sky on purpose. He even added a written note inside the picture explaining that the hospital stood where it would have blocked the view of the city gate, so he moved it out of the way. A reclining river god below stands for the Tagus that loops around the town.