BERRUGUETE, Alonso
(b. 1488, Paredes de Nava, d. 1561, Valladolid)

Choir-stall (detail)

1539-43
Wood carving
Cathedral, Toledo

Spanish Renaissance sculpture was at first entirely dominated by imported Italian artists. Later Alonso Berruguete, son of the painter Pedro Berruguete who possibly worked with Piero della Francesca in Urbino, became the finest Spanish sculptor of the sixteenth century. His style is expressive and his technique outstanding, particularly in his wooden choir-stall carvings, such as those at Toledo, where he achieves a notable dramatic quality, full of movement. His figures breeak out of their frames, and are filled with an emotional agitation which verges on the Baroque.