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A Flowering of Art in Madrid
Matias Costa for The New York Times
The new galleries of the Thyssen allow 200 more paintings to be displayed.
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By DALE FUCHS
 S
it stood, the Thyssen had no room to display more than 200 paintings,
from Bruegel to Braque. The Prado could not organize blockbuster
exhibitions without crowding into its permanent array of Spanish old
masters. And unless it added some architectural flair to its sturdy
18th-century headquarters, the Reina Sofía could hardly compete with
Europe's chic centers of modern art.
That's why cranes and
scaffolds now surround Madrid's premier museums. All three are
undergoing vast expansions to bring more of their collections into
public view - and attract a wider following. They are
installing auditoriums and libraries, sprucing up restaurants and gift
shops. Even the stuffy Prado Museum is making room for children's
workshops, lectures and provocative exhibitions by uncharacteristic
artists, like a recent hit show on Manet. The city plans
eventually to turn part of the car-clogged thoroughfare that joins the
three museums into a pedestrian mall, or "art walk," inspired by the
Museum Quarter in London, the Museum Island in Berlin and the Mall in
Washington. Madrid's commuters dread the idea of having less room to
drive on the tree-lined Paseo del Prado, but visitors will no longer
have to dodge harried drivers in the 10-minute stroll from museum to
museum. "The museums are finally waking up and becoming a
living force in the city," said a regional gallery director, Manuel
González Nuñez, during a recent painting contest outside the Prado. In
the background of his watercolor entry, a yellow crane hovers above the
gothic church of San Jerónimos, whose cloister, tucked behind the
Prado, is the centerpiece of the museum's $92 million expansion, slated
to double the museum's floor space. The first to stretch its legs
on the art walk is the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum. Its new annex, the
main phase of a $46 million project, opened June 10 next to the
neo-Classical Villahermosa mansion that houses the prestigious private
collection lent and then sold to Spain by Baron Thyssen-Bornemisza. The
annex holds 200 works amassed by the Baroness Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza
and her late husband since 1993. The paintings, few ever before on
permanent display, span the 17th through the 20th centuries. The
16 new modern-style galleries - with muted orange walls for a touch of
warmth - echo periods well represented in the museum's prior holdings,
like 17th-century Flemish painting (de Hooch, van der Neer, van
Ruysdael), German Expressionism (Kandinsky, Kirchner) and a large
sampling of 19th-century North American work. But they also reflect the
baroness's tastes, such as her penchant for landscapes and the
avant-garde. Purple trees shade yellow earth in Braque's
"Marina. L'Estaque," which hangs in a room devoted to the Fauvists. In
the Impressionist galleries, cool mauve mists envelope Monet's "Charing
Cross Bridge," accompanied by Pissarro's "Field of Cabbages," and the
blue-yet-cloudy skies of Sisley's "Flooding at Port-Marly." For
those unsatisfied by the rich diet of art, the enlarged Thyssen will
soon house a restaurant with a terrace overlooking the garden. The
kitchen is run by one of the city's finest restaurants, Paradís,
specializing in Catalonia's seafood and rice dishes. The
restaurant was to open for lunch last week, with an average meal
expected to cost about $30, at $1.25 to the euro, including wine. It
plans to serve dinner in July and August, when the museum stays open
until midnight. At this point, the most finished part of the
museum addition is the colorful, luminous gift shop, which has updated
its image - and price tags. Hand-painted silk scarves depicting scenes
by Gauguin and Kandinsky cost up to $470. Wine glasses with enamel
designs inspired by Léger and Ghirlandaio cost $55. The store also
sells ceramics, jewelry and imaginative art-themed puzzles, games and
books for children. Seven blocks from the Thyssen, the Reina
Sofía, opened as a museum in 1992 and home to Picasso's "Guernica,"
struggles to accommodate a growing collection of modern canvases. A $95
million expansion is intended to turn the former 18th-century hospital
into a true, contemporary arts center in the spirit of the Pompidou
Museum in Paris. Jean Nouvel, the French architect known for his work
on the Cartier Foundation and L'Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, is
transforming a triangular patch of land behind the original,
neo-Classical building into a miniature city of glass and steel.
A metallic red roof - sliced into a crisp, open grid to let in sun, wind and
rain - will hover above a central plaza with modern sculptures, an upscale
restaurant, shops and three see-through arts buildings. The biggest draw,
according to Lola Muñoz, the in-house architect, is expected to be the
350,000-volume reference library, which will open in one of the buildings by the
end of the year. In another, a 450-seat auditorium, to be completed about the
same time, will play host to concerts.
But for ordinary tourists, the most welcome addition will be the third
building, with its two vast galleries for large-scale exhibits, suggestive
lighting and all-glass facade. They are expected to open by the end of this
month with shows on Roy Lichtenstein and Salvador Dalí, Ms. Muñoz said.
The new galleries free space for the permanent collection, which includes a
wide sampling of Dalí's surreal fantasies and Miró{minute}s primary-colored
scribbles and stars. As it stands now, these modern icons compete with temporary
exhibitions, and the lines are daunting during popular shows.
When the scaffolding comes down around the Prado next year, this temple of
old masters will change from a single, sprawling building into an artistic
campus, in the words of the project's architect, the Pritzker-winning Spanish
architect Rafael Moneo, who designed the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in
Los Angeles and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Rather than simply fasten a
modern module onto the 1785 structure, Mr. Moneo will link the building
underground to a modern annex, concealing the passageway under a garden and
plaza.
Some of the museum's treasures - it can only show a fraction of its
collection - will move out of storage and into nearby historic buildings,
renovated to complement the Moneo annex. For instance, the Casón del Buen Retiro,
whose white columns look out onto lovely Retiro park, will again house the work
of 19th-century Spanish painters. The 17th-century palace next door, now the
Museo del Ejército (the Army museum), will also join the Prado campus.
The showpiece will be the Renaissance cloister next to the elegant Church of
San Jerónimos, built in the early 16th century and, until recently, the wedding
spot of choice for Spanish royalty. In 2001, the cloister was dismantled into
3,000 pieces, and now the columns, shields and arches are painstakingly being
reassembled as the centerpiece of the modern annex, according to an architect on
Mr. Moneo's team, Pedro Elcuaz. Modern galleries for temporary exhibits will
surround the cloister, opening up roughly 20 percent more floor space in the
original museum for the likes of Rubens, Bosch and Botticelli.
The modern Moneo annex will allow the cloister to peek out from a
brick-and-granite facade, trimmed with brass. Inside, it will consolidate the
more prosaic activities of the museum - there will be a new gift shop and
moderately-priced restaurant, for example - and house an auditorium for films
and chamber music, Mr. Elcuaz said.
Although the physical changes will take months to complete, the Prado's
attitude adjustment has already begun. The director, 39-year-old Miguel Zugaza,
has embarked on a campaign to make the museum "more dynamic," and less
intimidating.
That may be a tall order for a place where somber portraits of kings and
weeping Virgins hang in heavy, gilt frames. This is, after all, is a museum that
requires a battle plan to see its vast holdings of Goya, Velázquez and El Greco
without running out of steam.
But the Prado has clearly lightened up. English-speaking visitors, for
instance, no longer need to dust off high school Spanish to decipher informative
panels next to the paintings, as translations are being added. Audio guides are
available, too. In 2003, the museum began to offer educational and long
children's programs.
In August, the Spanish government voted to allow the museum to seek private
financing for special shows and activities. The results have included new
acquisitions - "The Pope's Barber" by Velázquez and three religious paintings by
Goya - and an explosion of popular temporary shows in collaboration with other
museums.
Such collaborations are a new at the Prado, traditionally absorbed with its
own spectacular holdings. But Titian and Vermeer shows last year began what will
be a more outward-looking trend to complement the collection, Mr. Zugaza said.
The most recent exhibition, which opened last October with loans from 34 museums
around the world, hung Manet's work alongside the Spanish masters who influenced
him, illustrating young Mr. Zugaza's approach.
In October, the museum will again break tradition with "The Spanish Portrait:
From El Greco to Picasso.'' In it, such Prado regulars as Ribera and Velázquez
will share billing with portraits by Picasso and Miró. The Prado also plans to
offer reservations for tour groups next year.
Museum Information
The museums sell a Paseo del Arte ticket for $9.60, at $1.25 to the euro,
which allows one visit to each museum within a year.
Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Paseo del Prado, 8, (34-91)
369-0151, and
www.museothyssen.org, is open every day but Monday. The combined entrance
fee for the permanent collection and special shows is about $8.60. Children
under 12 are free. The annex with the Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza collection
opened June 10. From mid-July to mid-September, the museum is open until
midnight. The new restaurant was scheduled to open last week for lunch, with
dinner served in July and August; (34-91) 429 2732.
The Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Santa Isabel,
52, (34-91) 467-5062, online at
museoreinasofia.mcu.es,
is closed on Tuesday. Admission is $3.70 (the price may increase due to
expansion), but free for those under 18 or over 65. Also free on Saturday from
2:30 to 9 p.m. and on Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. New exhibit spaces are
scheduled to open with shows on Roy Lichtenstein on Friday and Salvador Dalí on
June 28. The art library, auditorium and restaurant are scheduled to open by the
end of 2004.
Prado Museum, Paseo del Prado, (34-91) 330-2800,
www.museoprado.es, is closed
Monday. Admission: $3.70 (also may increase) but free for those under 18 and
over 65, and for everyone on Sunday. The Moneo annex and the renovation of
surrounding buildings on the future Prado "campus" are expected to be completed
by next spring.
DALE FUCHS contributes to The Times from Madrid.
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