Monument to Marçal de Sax

In the existing garden on the site adjacent to the temple of San Agustín -and Santa Catalina (martyr) – and formed by its left side wall, the parish building at the back and the streets of Mare de Déu de Gràcia and Guillem de Castro, was installed, on the initiative of the Official College of Teachers of Drawing of Valencia, a small and artistic monument -inaugurated on July 14, 1969- to the quatrecentista painter Marçal de Sax, one of the figures of Valencian pictorial art called “primitive”, or better late Gothic. The probable Nordic -Saxon- origin explains the strong expressive linearism of many of his figures, compatible thanks to his art and the contact of the Valencian masters and the Italian influence, together with a very remarkable formal beauty.

He is the author, documented, of the table of “the Incredulity of St. Thomas” of the Cathedral of Valencia and, by well-founded attribution, of the great altarpiece of the Hundred of the Feather (company of crossbowmen of escort of the Royal flag of Valencia) dedicated to Saint George, with scenes of his life and martyrdom and central panels of the Battle of Puig, of St. George with the Liberation of the Princess and the Virgin enthroned among angels, an altarpiece in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

The painter who also founded a school of painting, in Valencia that of “Mestre Marçal” was born in 1410 and died in Valencia, in great penury, barely helped in the most necessary. It is portrayed, in free version, in bronze, by the Valencian sculptor, of Villar de l’Arquebisbe, Rafael Pérez Contel, on a pedestal of square section and with the inscription that reads “Valencia to the Master Marçal of Sax. Homage of the Official College of Teachers of Drawing and Excm. City Council, MCMLXVIII”.

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