Francisco pradilla ortiz biography definition

Born in Villanueva de Gállego on 24 June 1848, Francisco Pradilla is deservedly held to be one of the foremost Spanish painters of the last quarter of the 19th century, in addition to the last great master of history painting of the century.

After being taught in Zaragoza by the painter and set designer Mariano Pescador – from whom he learned the characteristic spectacular appearance his history paintings have – and studying for a few years at the Special School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving in Madrid, in 1874 he went to Rome on a travel grant, remaining there for three years.

There he painted his great masterpiece, Doña Juana la Loca (“Queen Joan the Mad”), now in the Museo Nacional del Prado; he would be obsessed by this subject throughout his life and repeated it in many variants.

Extremely famous from the time it was executed, it earned him the medal of honour at the National Exhibition of Fine Arts of 1878 and immediately brought h