In the Old Masters auction on 21st May 2022, Lempertz will be offering a masterpiece of Spanish Golden Age painting, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo's Madonna of the Rosary. Murillo painted the work, which is characterised by its delicate style and sense of intimacy, in around 1655 for the Carmen Calzada monastery in Seville. It is the only one of the four versions of this motif that was signed by Murillo.
The commission from the monastery in his home town of Seville was of great importance to Murillo (as shown for example in the use of the valuable blue pigment azurite) since his work would compete there with paintings by none other than Diego Velázquez, who was represented at the monastery with two earlier works. During the turmoil of the Napoleonic Wars in the 19th century, the large-format painting eventually ended up in the collection of the English aristocrat Sir William Eden. It was later owned by the Spanish conductor and pianist José Iturbi in Los Angeles.