Painting

The Cathedral of Seville boasts one of the richest collections of artistic treasures preserved within ecclesiastical environments, earning it recognition as one of the finest art galleries in Spain. With an updated inventory that includes eight hundred and thirty-three entries, the majority of these paintings are of the highest quality.

This treasure, which we now make known in small part, has been formed over the centuries as a result of the desire of the Chapter itself to enrich its Cathedral and the eagerness of many of its canons who commissioned paintings to decorate altarpieces and chapels. Likewise, the main Sevillian families who chose the Cathedral as the site for their burials, adorned their chapels with pictorial compositions, in addition to those who, in their wills, left part of their collections to be placed in its dependencies. Thus, from the 15th to the 19th century, the history of painting is profusely represented in the Sevillian Cathedral.

Worthy of mention are the marvelous grilles of the different chapels and altars that, with their solemn bars, have contributed decisively to the fact that today we can contemplate the works placed there as if they had just been made, in addition to being the distance from the exterior of the same, at which the author would suppose that his work would be admired. This was vital to ensure the proper conservation of the paintings that were not within direct reach of the viewer. Let us now visualize a small part of this rich pictorial legacy with which this fantastic monument delights us.