Art: An Original El Greco

Across the state line in Missouri, there was news last week of an older and more celebrated name in art: Spain’s 16th century (1541-1614) master, El Greco. Kansas City’s William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art proudly announced that it had just bought El Greco’s Portrait of a Trinitarian Monk, one of his last and most impressionistic works, a magnificent study of a bearded cleric in white robes and a dark cape.

Painted about 1610, the 37 in. by 33 in. portrait was part of a private collection in Madrid, has only rarely been on public display. Kansas City, said the gallery, would see it next month, but no one would hint how much it had cost to bring El Greco’s monk to Missouri. A good guess: well over $100,000.