Retablo with Seven Scenes from the Life of the Virgin

Pere Espallargues was a Catalan painter active in the late fifteenth century, working in the rural areas of Catalonia and Aragon. This retablo with scenes from the life of the Virgin from around 1490 exemplifies the production of large altarpiece ensembles for Catalan parish churches. Such retablos, with their multiple narrative panels, served as visual catechism for largely illiterate congregations.

Tempera on panel with gold ground in the Catalan retablo tradition. The multi-scene format combines Marian narrative episodes within a unified altarpiece structure.