Focus on The Burial of the Count of Orgaz and analyze the Influences.
The composition of the painting has been closely related to the Byzantine iconography of the Dormition of the Mother of God. The argumentation supporting this point of view focuses on the icon of the Dormition by El Greco that was discovered in 1983 in the church of the same name in Syros. Robert Byron, according to whom the iconographic type of the Dormition was the compositional model for The Burial of the Count of Orgaz, asserts that El Greco as a genuine Byzantine painter worked throughout his life with a repertoire of components and motifs at will, depending on the narrative and expressive requirements of the art.On the other hand, Harold Wethey rejects as "unconvincing" the view that the composition of the Burial is derived from the Dormition, "since the work is more immediately related to Italian Renaissance prototypes". In connection with its elimination of spatial depth by compressing figures into the foreground, the early Florentine Mannerists—Rosso Fiorentino, Pontormo and Parmigianino—are mentioned, as well two paintings by Tintoretto: the Crucifixion and the Resurrection of Lazarus, the latter because of the horizontal row of spectators behind the miracle. The elliptical grouping of the two saints, as they lower the dead body, is said to be closer to Titian's early Entombment than to any other work. Wethey asserts that "El Greco's Mannerist method of composition is nowhere more clearly expressed than here, where all of the action takes place in the frontal plane".Philipp argues that the painting is heavily influenced by the contemporary Spanish funerary art, and that Greco adhered to this sepulchral artistic tradition while adapting a popular religious subject, the Entombment of Christ, to the needs of his assignment. Sarah Schroth believes that Titian's Entombment is used by Greco as a model to subtly pass his didactic message for the value of good works, and she mentions Albrecht Dürer's Adoration of the Trinity as an inspiration for the painting's bi-partite composition and the depiction of contemporary laymen in the lower, earthly zone. However, Scroth departs from Wethey's absolute rejection of the presence of Byzantine elements in the painting, and accepts Dormition as an influence for the Burial's depiction of the assumptio animae. A third work of Tintoretto, The Last Judgment, is mentioned by Schroth as a possible influence for the Burial's depiction of Gloria, since Greco wanted to incorporate elements of the funeral liturgy in the upper part of the painting.
Dormition Parmigianino Renaissance Titian Christ Rosso Fiorentino Entombment of Christ Adoration of the Trinity painting El Greco Tintoretto Syros Dormition of the Mother of God Spanish painter Harold Wethey iconography funerary art Entombment Pontormo Orgaz Albrecht Dürer