El Greco

1541-1614 · Greek (Crete; worked in Spain) · Mannerism / Early Baroque

Known for: Painter of elongated, spiritually charged figures whose eerie, electric colors anticipated Expressionism by 300 years

El Greco trained as an icon painter in Crete, studied in Venice under Titian's influence, then settled in Toledo, Spain, for 37 years. His elongated figures and eerie, electric colors were considered bizarre by contemporaries. He was largely forgotten until Expressionists and Cubists rediscovered him.

He was proud, litigious (sued patrons constantly over payment), and intellectual with an extensive library. He lived lavishly beyond his means and died in debt.

What El Greco would be watching

The “if they lived today” Q&A on this page gives El Greco The Passion of the Christ (2004) as a favourite film. Their reason: “Gibson understood suffering. The rest of the film is debatable.” Rankquant scores it above 64% of films, drawn from 1,367 IMDb reviewers individually re-centred rather than averaged raw. The full film & TV rankings are built the same way.

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