| The 'Avenue of Art', located in el Paseo del Prado
is doubtless unique. Along this stretch of elegant tree-lined
boulevard, set in one of the most typical parts of Madrid
and spaced within easy walking distances of one another,
are three of the leading art galleries in the world:
the Prado, Thyssen Bornemisza and Centro de Arte Reina
Sofía Museums.
Where else but along el Paseo del Prado could one have
the chance of seeing art of the calibre of The Maids
of Honour (Las Meninas) by Velázquez, Goya's Maja Nude
and Maja Clothed, "Giovanna Tornabuoni" by Ghirlandaio,
"Les Vessenots en Auvers" by Van Gogh and Picasso's
Guernica, to name but a few of the myriad masterpieces
on display?
The Prado Museum contains the world's finest
collection of Spanish paintings, including masterpieces
by El Greco, Velázquez, Goya. Paying attention to the
great artists of Spain's Golden Age (Siglo de Oro):
Ribera, Zurbarán and Murillo, The Flemish School is
represented by Van der Weyden and Hieronymus Bosch,
among others; there`s also samples of the Italian art
with the most complete collection of Titian and artists
of the Venetian School, as well as German, French and
English works on display, though fewer in number, are
equally superb examples of their kind.
The pictures lacking in El Museo del Prado, are splendidly
displayed in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum,
well endowed with Italian Primitives works. There are
also excellent examples of German Renaissance and Dutch
17th-century paintings and 19th-century American ones,
virtually non-existent elsewhere in Spain. From the
first stirrings of modern art, as seen in lmpresssionism,
up through the harsher years of German Expressionism
and Russian Constructivism, to experiments with Geometric
Abstraction and the tongue-in-cheek irreverence of Pop
Art… all are represented in this wide-ranging retrospective
that is the Thyssen Collection.
Leaving the other two galleries behind, our last call
brings us to one of the most famous and, in its time,
controversial masterpieces of this century: Picasso's
Guernica, now hanging in el Centro de Arte Reina
Sofía National Museum. The permanent collection
here is primarily made up of Spanish painting and sculpture:
Picasso, Gris, Miró, Dalí, Chillida and Tápies, along
with newer contemporaries. It is definitely a single
cultural walk. |
