PACHECO, Francisco (Sanlúcar de Barrameda 1564-Seville1644), Spanish.
Principally known today as the teacher and father-in-law of Velázquez^* and
the author of an important theoretical treatise on painting, Francisco
Pacheco played a significant role in developing and chronicling the artistic
culture of Seville during the first half of the seventeenth century. Possessed
of modest talents, Pacheco worked in the prevailing style of the late
sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Spaniards, in large measure derived
from Roman and Flemish mannerism. Later, under the influence of his
talented pupil Velázquez, he began to introduce a new and vivid realism into
his work.

Born into a seafaring family, Francisco lost his parents early and was
adopted by his uncle, a canon of Seville Cathedral. In Seville Francisco was
apprenticed to Luis Fernández and spent time copying works of Luis de
Vargas and Pedro de Campaña, besides making an intensive study of prints
after Raphael, Michelangelo, and Lucas van Leyden.

His career took an upward turn in the 1590s. In 1599 he was elected as
a governor of the painters' guild. That same year his uncle, the canon
Pacheco, died, and leadership of the academy the canon had established in
the 1560s was assumed by Francisco. The following year, the Cloister of the
Order of Mercy (the Merced Calzada) awarded him a major commission
(shared with Alonso Vazquez) for a portrayal of the lives of their founding
saints, Peter Nolasco and Raymond Nonnatus. Pacheco's contributions (such
as the Mercedarians Redeeming Christian Captives, Barcelona, Museo de Arte

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