Joan Mates (c. 1370-1431) was a Catalan painter of the International Gothic style, born in Villafranca del Panadés and active mainly in Barcelona. His career illustrates how an urban workshop served the Church and the nobility of Catalonia, Aragon and Sardinia.
In 1390 he settled in Barcelona in the workshop of Pere Serra, with whom he maintained a long relationship and collaborated on joint commissions, such as the altarpiece of the Virgin with the Saints of Syracuse (1400). After his master's death he took back some of his commissions, including the Annunciation altarpiece for the church of San Francesco di Stampace in Cagliari, made between 1406 and 1410 and now in the Pinacoteca Nazionale.
Mates enjoyed good relations with senior churchmen and Catalan noble families such as the Cabrera, Cervelló, Queralt and Foix. For them and for various towns in Aragon and Catalonia he produced altarpieces, the most notable being that of Saint James at Vallespinosa (1406-1410), commissioned by the Cervelló family and now in the Museu Diocesà de Tarragona. For Barcelona cathedral he was commissioned the large altarpiece of Saints Ambrose and Martin of Tours, and for the Pia Almoina, the altarpiece of Saint Sebastian, completed in 1431, in the final years of his output.
His workshop relied mainly on his stepson Francesc Oliva, who died young, and on his son Bernat Mates, documented between 1425 and 1462, whose artistic talent was limited. After the patriarch's death in 1431 the family business ceased. Another son, Jorge Mates, joined Jaume Huguet's workshop as an apprentice in 1469.
Works (4)
Religious painting dated 1417 and attributed to Joan Mates, now held at the National Art Museum of Catalonia. Its subject is Saint Sebastian, although the work is titled Calvary, which suggests a scene connected with the Crucifixion. The available information does not allow us to say more about its composition or the commission behind it.
Altarpiece devoted to the archangel Michael, attributed to Joan Mates and dated 1415, within the International Gothic style. As is typical of religious art, the archangel stands as the central figure of the devotional scene. The available information does not clarify its commission or composition, so the work is best approached with caution.
Saint John the Evangelist appears on the island of Patmos, where tradition holds he received the visions later recorded in Revelation. The scene places him in a cave, writing, which alludes to his work as an evangelist. Painted in tempera on a poplar panel, the work focuses attention on the saint and the rocky shelter that isolates him.
Joan Mates painted this Gothic work of religious subject, dated 1408, now held at the Museo Diocesano in Tarragona. With the available information, its original setting and specific iconography cannot be determined with certainty, so it is best approached as a document of Gothic painting from its time.
Where to see the work
- Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya Barcelona · 2
- Goya Museum Castres · 1