Francisco Pacheco on El Greco

“[El Greco liked] the colors crude and unmixed in great blots as a boastful display of his dexterity.. ..he believed in constant repainting and retouching in order to make the broad masses tell flat as in nature.”

“El Greco showed me in 1611 a cupboard full of clay models made by him to serve him in his work, and, a marvel beyond compare, the originális of every picture he had ever painted in his life, all in oils, on smaller canvasses, collected together in a hall which his son showed me by his orders.”

“Who will believe me if I say that Dominico Greco set his hand to his canvases many and many times over, that he worked upon them again and again.. ..but to leave the colours crude and unblent in great blots, as a boastful display of his dexterity. I call this working in order to accomplish little.”