Portrait of Gerónimo Antonio Gil

Rafael Ximeno y Planes, a native of Valencia, arrived in New Spain in 1794 to replace Cosme de Acuña as the director of painting in the recently founded San Carlos Academy. This portrait of Gerónimo Antonio Gil is one of the most important ones painted by the artist. Gil was sent to New Spain by the Spanish crown in order to serve as chief engraver in the Royal Mint, and, in this job, having become aware of the need to set up an academy of fine arts like the ones that existed in Spain, he proposed the said project to the king. His proposal was approved and he succeeded in setting up the first fine-arts institution in the colonies, naming it the Royal San Carlos Academy of the Three Noble Arts, in honor of the Spanish monarch. In this work, the artist achieves a sober and elegant portrait, from the waist up, of the engraver and founder of the San Carlos Academy, who has a severe, inflexible expression on his face, along with stiff hands and arms. The subject is wearing a fine green jacket adorned with large buttons on the left lapel and cuffs. So realistically have his clothes been depicted that we can imagine the texture of each garment. As befits his activities as an engraver, he is holding a die in his left hand and a gold coin in the other one. There is a classical sculpture on the table and, on the other side of the room, a piece of furniture bearing the rest of the tools of his trade, while, in the background, there is a large window through which the dim light that illuminates the scene enters. This work passed to the MUNAL from the San Diego Viceregal Painting Gallery in the year 2000.