José Nicolás de la Escalera

José Nicolás de Escalera (8 September 1734 – 3 July 1804) was a Cuban painter who specialised in Catholic art and portrait painting. He is often described as "Cuba's first painter", having been the earliest native-born artist to create a large, surviving body of professional work. Little is known about his artistic education; he appears to have been self-trained, and his work bears some resemblance to that of the eighteenth-century Andalusian school, especially paintings by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo. Most of his work was religious in nature. He is particularly known for the oils that adorn the cupola of the Church of Santa María del Rosario, erected by the Counts of Bayona from 1760 - 1766. He also executed works at the Convent of San Francisco in Havana (Regina Angelorum) and the Church of Our Lady of Candelaria in Guanabacoa (San José with the sleeping child and The Coronation of the Virgin by the Holy Trinity). however, some of his works, such as Virgen, show glimmers of the bold, colorful naturalism which would one day come to define Cuban art.

There are about fifty known examples of his work in collections in Cuba, Spain, and the United States, including many which can be seen at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes de La Habana, and the College of San Geronimo's Jose Nicolas de Escalera Art Gallery in Havana. A handful remain in the churches and institutions where they were originally painted. De Escalera died in Havana on 3 July 1804.

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