Saint Faust cultivator

This devotional work depicting Saint Faust as a cultivator or laborer reflects the tradition of depicting minor saints in genre-like settings that merged devotional painting with everyday life. Del Mazo demonstrates here his capacity to work in devotional subjects alongside the landscape and portrait work for which he is better known. The agricultural saint — associated with Christian labor — was an unusual choice that suggests a specific commission, possibly for a guild or agrarian brotherhood.

The saint is shown in an outdoor setting associated with cultivation, his working tools present as attributes. Del Mazo uses the naturalistic outdoor lighting he developed through his study of Velázquez's methods, situating the figure in a realistically observed natural environment.