Entre el Cisma de Occidente y la conversión: en torno al retablo de la Santa Cruz y los Sacramentos encargado por Bonifacio Ferrer

This paper relates the retable commissioned by Bonifacio Ferrer (1355-1417) for the Holy Cross chapel in Portaceli charterhouse with two events of public importance in which he was involved and that marked his personal and public life. So far, interpretation of the altarpiece preserved at Museo de Bellas Artes in Valencia has followed two main paths: first, a dogmatic and theological key about the sacraments, lending often a particular name to the same retable; second, a personal one presenting the work as a result of the sponsor's decision to enter the charterhouse after a long trial and the loss of most of the members of his family a few years before. Here a complementary reading is proposed, considering Bonifacio's personal and intellectual motivations to show his attitude in front of the conflicts tearing his life and the community where he lived: Western Schism and the trial against the city representatives at the parliament (Corts) in Monzón and the anti-Jewish riots in Valencia. The choice of the workshop to paint the altarpiece, widely debated and close to a certain consensus, but should be put in a historical and cultural context as much specific as permitted by our knowledge of the patron and the circumstances surrounding a personal and distinctive commission.