Madrid - 티센 박물관 Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum > 호기심 여행박사

Carpaccio, Dürer, Caravaggio, Rubens, Frans Hals, Gauguin, Van Gogh, Klee, Hopper, Kirchner... These are but a few of the old masters whose work is on display under a single roof at Palacio de Villahermosa, the Madrid headquarters of the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Foundation.

 

The decision to keep one of the world’s most renowned private collections in Madrid is testimony to the importance the Spanish capital places on art. Located in Madrid’s most beautiful district, the Thyssen makes up the third leg of a triangle unrivalled the world over, the Art Walk, a physical and conceptual space that encompasses a history of world art from antiquity to today.

 

Home to almost eight hundred paintings, as well as the recent addition of 220 new works from the Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, the Museum complements both the Prado, through its ancient paintings, and the collection of modern painting on display at the Reina Sofía Art Centre. One of the Thyssen’s most salient features is that its collection is strong in areas often underrepresented at Spanish museums, including the early Italian school, the German Renaissance, 17th-century Dutch painting, 19th-century American painting, Impressionism, German Expressionism, Russian Constructivism, Geometric Abstraction and Pop Art.

Initially loaned for a period of nine and a half years and then bought outright in 1993 by the Spanish government, the museum’s collection is the product of the collector’s passion of the recently deceased Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza and his father, Baron Heinrich.

 

Baron Heinrich began the collection in the 1920s and managed to accumulate around 525 paintings over the course of his life. Upon his death in 1947, the collection was divided up and dispersed among his heirs. Subsequently, his son, Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza, keen to reassemble the collection, bought back the works from his relatives.

 

The collection soon outgrew Villa Favorita, the complex purchased by his father to house it in the Swiss town of Lugano, and the baron decided to seek out a new location for his art. The proximity of the Prado Museum and the quality of the premises offered him by the Spanish government convinced him to move the collection to Palacio de Villahermosa in Madrid, a late 18th-century building renovated by Rafael Moneo.

The Thyssen collection offers visitors a tour of the history of European painting, from its origins in the 13th century to the final years of the 20th. Laid out chronologically, it allows visitors to follow the most important trends, beginning with the early Italians all the way through to late Surrealism and the emergence of Pop Art in the 1960s.

 

In addition to the early Italians (Christ and the Samaritan Woman by Duccio di Buoninsegna) and Dutch (Annunciation Diptych by Jan Van Eyck), the museum is also quite strong in portraits (Giovanna Tornabuoni by Ghirlandaio) and in scenes of contemporary life, interiors and landscapes from the 17th-century Dutch school.

 

The 17th-century Flemish painting The Toilet of Venus by Rubens , the 19th-century American painting The Lock by Constable, and the Impressionist paintings by Gauguin, Degas, Van Gogh, Toulouse-Lautrec, Monet and Renoir also vie for visitors’ attention. The tour of the collection ends with Surrealism and Pop Art, the most prominent artists on display being Rauschenberg and Lichtenstein.

 

It is difficult to single out the most important piece among so many excellent works of art, though two of the most admired are Saint Catherine of Alexandria by Caravaggio and Portrait of a Young Night in a Landscape by Carpaccio. The museum likewise calls attention to “a Cubist painting by Picasso called Man with a Clarinet and Painting with Three Red Spots by Kandinsky”.

The plans to enlarge the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum respond to the need to increase available space in order to exhibit the Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection to the public. After the original collection was sold to the Kingdom of Spain, the baron and baroness continued, first jointly then the baroness acting alone, to collect, acquiring the many works of art now on display in the 16 new rooms.

 

As a result of the enlargement, two buildings– the original one and the new premises on Calle Marqués de Cubas– were fused into a single space in which activities and routes could be shared. The new Thyssen thus respectfully blends the elegant work of its original rear façade with the modern exterior of the newer building.

 

 

Comprised of 220 pieces (out of some 300 loaned), the baroness’s collection is characterised throughout by a strong emphasis on landscape, from 18th-century Italian Vedutism to 19th-century paintings, the American school and the collection’s core Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works. The historical tour ends with a fascinating survey of early 20th-century avant-garde pieces, with special emphasis on Fauvism and German Expressionism.

 

Thanks to this new space, the museum’s top floor is now also home to a lookout terrace with magnificent views over the city of Madrid. In summer, this exceptional location harbours a restaurant to complement the famous Museum Nights, coinciding with the extension of public opening hours until midnight in July and August.

 

Additionally, one end of the vestibule now holds a gift shop and bookstore, which, thanks to its larger area and more accessible location, offers a convenient display of the objects on sale that can be seen from outside.

The Foundation is devoted to the conservation, study, exhibit and dissemination of the works of art that make up the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection. Its standing programmes (temporary exhibits, educational activities, conference cycles, “The Painting of the Month” series, concerts, etc.) and the museum’s day-to-day activities aim to ensure that visits are as enriching as possible for all visitors, from groups of schoolchildren to art experts or tourists from around the world.

 

In addition to exhibiting its collection, the Thyssen actively engages in research, conservation, restoration, educational and communications-related work. The Foundation has geared its efforts and initiatives toward involving and promoting the world of art in society through institutional development programmes (the Friend Card, volunteer programmes, etc.) and special promotions (private visits, the Art Walk, etc.).

 

The museum places high priority on holding temporary exhibits. The exhibit programme blends conventional exhibits (three a year) with contextual ones, which focus on the works included in the permanent collection and are held two or three times a year. In honour of one of the museum’s most successful exhibits, El Greco: Identity and Transformation, a new audio guide service was launched to facilitate exhibit tours.