León

John Taylor Arms

León was the first in Arms' Spanish Churches Series of fifteen plates. León, a city on the Bernesga River in northwest Spain, is the capital of the Province of León. It is home to many churches and cathedrals, but here Arms depicted the ancient buildings of the city, contrasted to the looming thirteenth-century Gothic Santa Maria de Regla de León Cathedral. The cathedral with its towers, flying buttresses, and stained-glass windows, is considered one of the greatest works of the Gothic style. León is also famous for the Casa Botines designed by the Spanish architect, Antoni Gaudi.

Arms spoke of his love for architecture: "A building possesses truly as does a human being, a skeleton, a covering of flesh, and clothing with which both are in turn covered, so also, and most poignantly, does it possess a spirit," ... "In the work of the great interpreters of architecture . . .Meryon, Piranesi, Canaletto, and Bone, it is this expression of the spirit of the subject . . . which makes them such enduring works of art."