Lot 62: Miguel Jacinto Meléndez (Oviedo 1679-1734 Madrid)

The Annunciation
oil on canvas
60.2 x 47.2 cm.

Martinez collection (according to a label on reverse).
Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 17 April 1996, lot 20.

Principally active as a portraitist for the Spanish royal family and aristocracy, Meléndez, who was uncle to the renowned still-life painter Luis Meléndez, became court painter to King Philip V in 1712. He was however, equally active as a painter of religious subjects and, as Professor Pérez Sánchez notes, in these pictures Meléndez's style combines delicate coloring and a rococo sensibility.

There are two Annunciations by Meléndez both signed and dated with eight years apart. The first one dated 1710 (Fine Arts Museum, San Franscisco) is known as his earliest religious composition and is very similar in format, 60 x 40 cm., to the present painting. The other Annunciation in a private collection, Madrid, of large scale, 188 x 210 cm., is signed and dated 1718. The present lot is presumably a preparatory study for this remarkable Annunciation which is considered among the artist's most important works.

Christie's charge a premium to the buyer on the final bid price of each lot sold at the following rates: 23.8% of the final bid price of each lot sold up to and including € 150,000 and 14.28% of any amount in exces of € 150,000. Buyers' premium is calculated on the basis of each lot individually.