F. Lope Felix de Vega Carpio

A rare, three quarter length, seated portrait of the Spanish playwright and poet Lope Felix de Vega Carpio (1562-1635). The first Spanish dramatist to make a living as a playwright, now considered the greatest of all Spanish playwrights. Lope is said to have written over 2,200 plays, over 500 of which have survived, including Fuente Ovejuna or The Sheep Well (1614) in which a tyrannous feudal lord is murdered by villagers who refuse to confess and are eventually spared by intervention of the king. Other popular plays by Lope de Vega include The Foolish Lady (1613), Finding Truth Through Doubt (1620-24), The Knight from Olmeda (1622) and Punishment without Revenge (1631). He is depicted wearing his priestly robes (he became a priest in 1614), seated writing at his desk, with a classical statue in a niche in the background.