The vision of Saint Anthony of Padua

Murillo's Vision of Saint Anthony of Padua, painted in 1656 for the baptismal chapel of Seville Cathedral and remaining there to this day, is the most dramatic story in his biography — a theft, a transatlantic recovery, and a restoration that returned the painting to its original home. In 1874 a thief cut out the figure of Saint Anthony from the canvas, which was eventually tracked to a dealer in New York, recovered by the Spanish consul, and restored to the cathedral. The incident demonstrated both the international art market's voracious appetite for Old Master works regardless of their legal status and the deep attachment Seville felt toward its most beloved painting. The cathedral commission itself was one of the most important Murillo ever received — the baptismal chapel of Seville's main church placed his work at the religious and civic heart of the city. The composition, showing Anthony in ecstatic vision as the Christ Child descends in a cascade of divine light, united Murillo's mastery of supernatural luminosity with his gift for rendering the physical experience of divine encounter.

The monumental composition spans an architectural interior opening onto a heavenly vision, with the kneeling saint forming the anchor between terrestrial and divine realms. Murillo's handling ranges from precise still-life detail in the foreground to dissolving atmospheric luminosity in the angelic choir above.