Antonio Vilca Sold at Auction Prices

ANTONIO VILCA (CUZCO, VICEROYALTY OF PERU, ACTIVE FROM 1778 TO 1803)

Antonio Vilca (Cuzco, Viceroyalty of Peru, active from 1778 - 1803) "Saint Eulalia with scenes of martyrdom" Oil on canvas glued onto hardboard. Dated 1799. Handwritten inscription: "Santa olalla Virgen y martir A 12 FEBREO Año de 1799" (Saint Eulalia, virgin and martyr on the 12th February, Year of 1799). 83 x 68 cm. With a certificate by Professor Alba Choque Porras. As Professor Alba Torres notes in the certificate: “We attribute the painting analysed in this study to the Cuzco based painter Antonio Vilca due to its technique and the characteristics of depiction of the central character when comparing it with other paintings that have been proven to be by Vilca. The painting being analysed has a relationship with another which is also attributed to Antonio Vilca, a late 18th century Divine Shepherdess which can currently be found in the collection at the National Museum of Archaeology, Anthropology and History of Peru, in which both female figures show great similarity in their shape and in Vilca’s characteristic colouring. Additionally, if it is compared with another painting by the same artist, Our Lady of Candelaria with the Archangels Gabriel and Michael, Saint Anthony of Padua and Saint Joseph in the Church of Pujiura the great similarity that the Archangel Gabriel has to Saint Eulalia and the Divine Shepherdess can be appreciated. The physiognamy created by Antonio Vilca is the same, as well as the gestures, the colour and the wrinkles in the dresses. Antonio Vilca was an indigenous painter, active in Cuzco from 1778 to 1803. The historians Teresa Gisbert and José de Mesa have done the most work on compiling information about the majority of his work. Vilca features among the most famous masters of the Cuzco School in the final stages of the Viceroyalty of Peru, he was the artistic heir of Marcos Zapata (who died in 1773), one of the greats of the Cuzco School. Vilca’s work filled the void that was left by Zapata for at least 25 years, given the presence of the work that he did in different churches in the former capital of the Inca Empire at that time. He did continue Zapata’s successful style, but he also began to introduce differences which updated the taste for the baroque in Cuzco. He was one of the artists that introduced the rockery to Southern Andean painting, taken from the German engravings which served as models for various paintings of his. However, he maintained the characteristics of the facial features of Marcos Zapata’s style, although they are a little sharper. He also maintained the predominance of drawing, the use of blues and reds and the depiction of local flora and fauna. Antonio Vilca painted Our Lady of Candelaria with the archangels Gabriel and Michael, Saint Anthony of Padua and Saint Joseph in the Church of Pujiura in Cuzco, dated 1778. Years later he did a series of Litanies of the Blessed Virgin Mary and another similar one for the church of Zurite dated in 1803. Both series were inspired by the engravings by the Klauber brothers which were inserted in the book devoted to Letanía Lauretanae, published in Freiburg by Franciscus Xavieris Dornn in 1750”.