Saint Margaret

Juan Rexach was a Valencian painter active in the mid-fifteenth century who trained under Lluís Dalmau and carried the Flemish influence Dalmau had introduced from Bruges throughout the Valencian altarpiece tradition. His Saint Margaret depicts the virgin martyr of Antioch who swallowed by a dragon but emerging unharmed from its belly became a symbol of birth and protection in medieval popular piety. Margaret's cult was particularly strong in the Crown of Aragon, and Rexach produced multiple altarpiece wings and panels devoted to her life across his career.

Rexach renders Margaret in the Flemish-influenced manner he inherited from Dalmau — careful oil glazes over tempera, meticulous fabric detail in her rich gown, and a precise rendering of the dragon emerging from beneath her feet. The gold ground is tooled in the Valencian manner with dense punched patterns framing her figure.