Stuff to see

Earlier this month, I made a day trip to Madrid, taking advantage of the great AVE service–train to Madrid in the morning, train back in the evening, giving me about 10 hours to enjoy the city and its museums and galleries. It was a rainy day, so instead of the three museums I had planned to visit–the Prado, the Reina Sofía and Fundación Mapfre–I ended up also visiting the Thyssen-Bornemisza museum after seeing posters advertising a Georgia O’Keeffe exhibition there. The highlights of the four museums were:

Museo del Prado: the special exhibition was Pasiones Mitológicas, a collection of paintings focusing on love, the human body and so on. Lots of masterpieces by Titian, Rubens and others. In addition, as I always do when I go to the Prado, I visited the room housing the incredible paintings by Hieronymus Bosch.

Fundación Mapfre: here, the main attraction was a large retrospective of photographs by Bill Brandt. But also the Espace Miró, showcasing many works by Joan Miró, was well worth a visit.

Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza: this was the unplanned visit, but between the rain and the prospect of seeing a large retrospective of Georgia O’Keeffe, I walked up there–and I did not regret it. I was familiar with her work from New Mexico, but I had not seen her early black & white paintings, nor her paintings from New York City that she made when living there in the 1920s.

Museo Reina Sofía: another place I almost always visit, usually to enjoy the garden and to see Picasso’s Guernica and otherwise just take a somewhat random look at the permanent collection. But this time I actually skipped Guernica and instead turned my attention to an exhibition of post-independence art from Morocco. It was very interesting to see work by artists whom I had never encountered before. It is the kind of eye-opening experience that makes it so enjoyable to visit art galleries.

I have created a photo gallery documenting my artsy day in Madrid.

Nathan