Spanish school; second half of the 17th century. "Jesuit Saint". Oil on canvas. Re-framed. Size: 60 x 42 cm; 66 x 48 cm (frame). Spanish Baroque painting is one of the most authentic and personal examples of our art, because its conception and its form of expression arose from the people and the deepest feelings that nestled in them. With the economy of the state in ruins, the nobility in decline and the clergy heavily taxed, it was the monasteries, parishes and confraternities of clerics and laymen who encouraged its development, with the works sometimes being financed by popular subscription. Painting was thus obliged to express the prevailing ideals in these environments, which were none other than religious ones, at a time when Counter-Reformation doctrine demanded a realistic language from art so that the faithful could understand and identify with what was depicted, and an expression endowed with an intense emotional content to increase the fervour and devotion of the people. Religious themes were therefore the main subject matter of Spanish sculpture during this period, which in the early decades of the century was based on a priority interest in capturing the natural world, gradually intensifying over the course of the century in the depiction of expressive values.