According to Rosemarie Mulcahy, the reputation of Philip II has suffered from bad press throughout the years. She writes, “The image [of Philip] that prevails is that of the severe assiduous defender of the Catholic Faith, a dry and mean-spirited personality” (xv). Indeed, the specter of the Inquisition, the harsh Spanish rule of the Netherlands, and the aloof late portraiture of the man in black have done little to counter negative impressions. In this book, composed of both previously published research and new material, Mulcahy aims to realign our perception of Philip through the examination of his artistic patronage. She offers us an expertly documented and multivalent study, casting new light on the famously prudent king’s contribution to Western culture. In her assessment, Philip’s artistic patronage reveals his character, especially relevant in light of his introverted personality and the paucity of surviving private correspondence by the Spanish monarch. The genuine merit of a study focusing on artistic patronage, in my estimation, is whether Mulcahy’s book presents an impression of Philip’s true aesthetic outlook. Does she reach beyond a mere historical and archival study?

A painting by an obscure Spanish artist in the National Gallery of Ireland sparked Mulcahy’s initial interest in her subject. The work depicts Abraham and the Three Angels by Juan Fernández de Navarrete “el Mudo,” who was Philip’s favorite Spanish painter of religious subjects. Although Navarrete is little known today, his contemporaries praised him highly, even dedicating poems to the mute Spanish painter who “spoke through his paintings.” Through an enthusiastic analysis of his stylistic sources and artistic progression, Mulcahy resurrects Navarrete’s career, almost championing the painter, in a lengthy chapter. The monographic treatment of Navarrete comprises only one of five chapters forming an ambitious overview of the artists and the artistic preferences of Philip II.

Mulcahy credits Philip with transforming the arts in Spain from provincial to worthy of international respect. To make her point, she focuses throughout the book on the building and decoration of the Escorial. This extraordinarily ambitious building project outside Madrid defined Philip as a patron of the arts. He employed a dizzying array of artists to work at the Escorial, and Mulcahy usefully discusses previously unknown artists such as Navarrete with the familiar, including Benvenuto Cellini and Adriaen de Vries. Many readers may be surprised, as this one was, to learn that de Vries contributed to the Escorial, while in the employ of Milanese sculptor Pompeo Leoni. These two sculptors created the statues for the high altarpiece of the basilica. The commission, like many at the Escorial, took far longer than predicted by both the artists and the patron. The original contract outlined fifteen larger-than-life bronze figures for the high altar to be completed in four years; the project lasted a decade! This presented a problem for de Vries in particular, who had a spendthrift nature and frequently requested advances in his salary (224). Unfortunately, this engaging chapter seems far too short—though, happily, one can turn to Mulcahy’s earlier study, The Decoration of the Royal Basilica of El Escorial (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994), which won the Eleanor Tufts Award from the American Society for Hispanic Art Historical Studies in 1996. Nonetheless, in the present volume, it would have been interesting to learn more about Philip’s reception of the Leoni and de Vries’s sculptures for the Escorial high altar.

Among the highlights in Mulcahy’s study is the account of Cellini’s life-size Carrara marble figure of the Crucified Christ, sent by Francesco I de Medici as a diplomatic ploy to strengthen the ties between the Medici and Philip. Mulcahy illuminates the complicated and “melodramatic” history of Cellini’s masterpiece with archival letters and historical intrigues, including illicit love affairs and the double murder of Medici princesses. One of the two strangled princesses was Eleonora di Toledo, a ranking Spanish subject and niece of the better-known Eleonora, wife of Cosimo I. Fearing damaging repercussions from the highly decorous Philip, Francesco knew how to assuage the king by sending him Cellini’s crucifix. (Cellini had intended this crucifix for his own tomb in Santa Maria Novella.) As Mulcahy notes, anyone expecting to curry favor with Philip by giving him art had best make sure the present was devotional. If one could secure a relic, all the better, as this usually ensured an audience from Philip (72).

The Cellini account aside, Mulcahy’s discussions of lesser-known artists and other aspects of Philip’s patronage make her book a worthy read. Art-historical literature unfortunately often passes over the Spanish artists standing outside the pantheon of Diego Velázquez, Bartolomé Estebán Murillo, and Francisco de Goya. As Mulcahy rightly notes in her last chapter, “Can we imagine a show entitled ‘From Sánchez Coello to Pantoja de la Cruz’ dazzling the crowds?” (267). Philip II of Spain: Patron of the Arts is not a book about superstars, but rather about the underdogs. Mulcahy’s engaging subchapter on the portrait painter Sánchez Coello, “Two letters by Alonso Sánchez Coello,” firmly attests to this premise. Initially under the patronage of Philip’s sister, Princess Juana, Sánchez Coello caught the attention of the king and spent thirty successful years painting portraits of the royal family. In spite of his service, his life and oeuvre remain obscure, which is exacerbated by the scarcity of surviving works. Fires in the palaces of the Alcázar of Madrid and the El Pardo destroyed many of the artist’s paintings, and Mulcahy thus bases much of her discussion on two previously unpublished letters, one of which was written directly to Philip by the court artist. The letters reveal a palpable sense of Sánchez Coello’s personality and, in particular, his professional life in relationship to the Spanish court. Philip, we learn, was very fond of Sánchez Coello and often visited the chambers of the artist unannounced. Aside from the painter’s contribution to court portraiture and his documentation of the royal visage, he played a diplomatic role in Spain’s efforts toward expansion in China. Philip sent four of Sánchez Coello’s paintings to the Chinese Emperor Shen Tsung (Wan-Li, 1573–1619).

The section on Sáchez Coello may be brief in order to devote more discussion to Spanish royal portraiture in general. Mulcahy gives a particularly interesting view of the relative prominence of the genre of portraiture in Spanish art in comparison to history, mythological, or landscape painting. First, these traditions were not well developed, and second, the Spanish royals held their ancestors in tremendous esteem, even doffing their hats out of respect when passing by a portrait, as if the painted image were real.

Among the other attributes of Mulcahy’s study is her invocation of a tangible perception of life at the Spanish court. Artists were hired and fired; Philip became impatient with delays; artists complained about working conditions and the harsh winters in Madrid. Particularly evocative is her insight regarding Philip’s treatment of his artists. Many artists employed by the court constantly had problems receiving timely payment. These financial tribulations reflected more the slowness of court bureaucracy than any parsimony on the part of Philip. Even when the king was displeased with the result of a project or, for that matter, with an artist, he often dealt judiciously concerning financial matters. Such is the case with the famed Italian painter Federico Zuccaro, a great success in Europe except the Spanish peninsula. Although Zuccaro spent three years at the court, “[l]ittle of what he painted pleased the King, nor anyone, and nothing he did lived up to the expectations raised by his fame” (229). Philip found Zuccaro’s frescos for the Cloister of the Evangelists in the Escorial most unsatisfactory, and after Zucarro left Spain, the works were erased and the commission given to Pellegrino Tibaldi. Nevertheless, Philip rewarded Zuccaro handsomely, paying him above his original contract and sending him back to Italy laden with gifts. It may have been Zuccaro’s innovative allegorical solutions to religious themes that the pious and traditional Philip found unappealing. Zucarro painted an Annunciation scene for the reliquary altar in the Escorial in which the Virgin, as the painter described, is “startled and perturbed when the angel first enters” (231). Philip found such a depiction of the Virgin in an agitated state to be unacceptable for the orthodoxy required at the Escorial.

Relatively independent studies comprise Mulcahy’s book; therefore, the chapters often read as vignettes that are distinct from one another rather than as a cohesive whole. A conclusion and tighter proofreading (several typographical errors appear throughout the manuscript) would have left this reviewer a bit more satisfied upon closing the cover of an otherwise informative and enjoyable read.

After considering the full of Mulcahy’s learned and well-documented study, the bad press from which the author states Philip II of Spain unjustly suffered remains to be assessed. Was he in reality merely the harsh facilitator of Habsburg expansion, or did he have many facets including that of a passionate art collector? Does this examination of Philip’s artistic patronage offer a more profound look or new insight into Philip the man and his aesthetic sensibilities? In exploring the thematic diversity of this book, several themes come into play. The richness and abundance of Philip’s artistic patronage astonishes. He was without exception a highly engaged, erudite, and pious patron. Philip had a reputation for incorruptibility, apparent not only in his approach toward artistic commissions, but also in his political and social encounters. Perhaps such a flawless leader with respect to moral probity is part legend, as history has often taught that few leaders instilled with the enormous power as that of Philip remain beyond the pale. Nonetheless, the remaining legacy of his patronage, in particular the Escorial and the art that fills this grand edifice, certainly testify to an individual who, regardless of how we may assess his political motives, epitomized an inspired and generous patron of the arts.