Velázquez, ingenioso : intertextuality and biographical artifice in early modern Spanish artistic writing

Abstract

Focusing on the figure of Diego Velázquez, this article examines the significance of the notion of ingenio in early modern Spanish writings about painting. First, it considers its relevance to discussions about natural talent, including the links with treatises like Examen de ingenios. Second, it shows how the adoption of ingenio as a motif in two biographies of the young Velázquez contributed to the crafting of a contrived narrative on the artist, privileging his giftedness and independence. Third, it considers other articulations of this rhetoric of ingenio in relation to Velázquez’s art, particularly regarding matters of practice and skill.