Mateo Cerezo

Mateo Cerezo painted religious pictures in the warm, loose style of the Madrid school, blending the colour of Titian with the tenderness of Murillo. His short career produced altarpieces, devotional paintings and a few still lifes.

He was born in Burgos in 1637, the son of a painter, and moved to Madrid to study under Juan Carreño de Miranda. He also learned from the Venetian and Flemish paintings in the royal collection. He worked in Burgos, Valladolid, Valencia and Madrid, and died in Madrid in 1666, not yet thirty. His Assumption of Mary is in the Prado, which holds several of his works, and his Ecce Homo is in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest.

In The Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine, look at the soft, warm light and the rich colour of the robes.