In Ictu Oculi

Juan de Valdés Leal painted this Baroque allegory of death in 1672 for the Hospital de la Caridad in Seville. The title comes from Corinthians 15:52: "In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye." Death, as a skeleton, extinguishes a candle while treading on a globe. Symbols of worldly power, crowns, tiaras, books, weapons, lie scattered beneath.

The painting forms a pair with Finis Gloriae Mundi, which shows rotting corpses in a crypt. Both are memento mori, reminders of mortality that Valdés Leal called "hieroglyphs of our afterlife." He founded the Seville Academy of Art with his friend Murillo, though their styles differed dramatically, Murillo's serene, Valdés Leal's somber and theatrical. The work measures 216 x 220 cm, oil on canvas, and remains at its original location in the Hospital de la Caridad, Seville.