Brief Biography-Juan de Valdés Leal was a painter, sculptor, and architect born in Seville in 1622. Antonio del Castillo was his master in Córdoba. There, he later worked with Murillo and was influenced by the works of Velázquez. In Seville, he painted the renowned Pictures for La Caridad, the Triumph of the Cross, and the Hieroglyphic of Death. Of the latter work, Antonio Palomino states, it represents a dead Corpse corrupted, and half devour’d with Worms, which gives an Horror and Dread to look at it; besides it is so natural, that many seeing it, inadvertently, have either shrunk back with fear, or stopp’d their Noses, lest they should be infected with the Stench of Corruption.
In 1647, he married the daughter of Antonio Palomino, and in 1660, he co-founded the Seville Academy of Art with Murillo. He died in Seville in 1690.