Displaying items by tag: diego velazquez

Treasures from the National Galleries of Scotland will be visiting the Kimbell Art Museum at the end of June and staying through September. Some of the works have never been shown in the U.S., and one is quite a rare treat, as it has not left Scotland for more than 50 years — Sandro Botticelli’s The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child (c. 1490).

The Scottish collection parallels the Kimbell’s in many respects, and with several of the same artists, such as Velázquez, Rembrandt, Cézanne, Monet and Braque

One of the most comprehensive displays of works by Diego Velázquez is opening this week at Paris’s Grand Palais. Showcasing 119 artworks from museums around the globe, it will cover the breadth of his career. But pulling together this large retrospective of the influential 17th-century Spanish painter was no easy feat for curator Guillaume Kientz.

Mr. Kientz, the chief conservationist for Spanish paintings at the Louvre, which is jointly producing the exhibition, spent the past two years negotiating with private collectors and museums to assemble some of the Spanish master’s most famous works in what will be the Grand Palais’s blockbuster show of the year.

A major portrait by Francis Bacon will be one of the highlights of the evening sale of Post-War and contemporary art in New York. Painted in 1960, "Seated Figure" stems from Bacon's total obsession with Velazquez's "Portrait of Pope Innocent X" and stands as an exceptional example of the artist’s painterly practice. It is a rare occasion for a major painting from Bacon's Papal series to be offered for auction, having remained unseen by the public for 35 years before being acquired by its present owner in 1996, "Seated Figure (Red Cardinal)" is a crowning culmination of Francis Bacon’s renowned Papal series. This major work will be on view in London before being sold at auction in New York on November 12th.

Luxuriant swathes of cream, violet, and aquamarine form the Pope’s features, highlighted by delicate gossamer-like sweeps of pure, bright white that form the folds of his silk cloaks.

The Wallace Collection's Great Gallery, which contains paintings by masters including Rubens, Velazquez and Titian, has reopened after a £5m refurbishment.

Regarded as one of the finest picture galleries in the UK, the exhibition space had been closed for two years.

The central London gallery boasts some of the most famous 17th Century European paintings in the country.

After a triumphant tour of Japan, then the United States and ending in Italy, the "Girl with a Pearl Earring" has returned home to the Mauritshuis royal picture gallery in The Hague. For ever. The museum, which reopened last month after two years' renovation work, will no longer allow Vermeer's masterpiece out. Officially the Mona Lisa of the North has been gated in order to please visitors to the Mauritshuis who only want to see that painting. Its fame has steadily increased since Tracy Chevalier published her novel in 1999 followed in 2004 by the film by Peter Webber starring Scarlett Johansson. Anyone wanting to see the portrait will have make the trip to the Dutch city.

"Girl with a Pearl Earring" thus joins the select band of art treasures that never see the outside world. Botticelli's "Birth of Venus" never leaves the Uffizi in Florence; "Las Meninas" by Velázquez stays put at the Prado in Madrid; Picasso's "Guernica" remains just down the road at the Reina Sofia museum; and his "Demoiselles d'Avignon" can only be seen at MoMA in New York.

Nothing quite stirs the emotions like walking into a gallery to see an original masterpiece.

Seeing that same piece on a digital screen may not have the same effect until now, but one Spanish group claims iPad art-viewing could give a greater insight than you might think.

Madrid’s famous gallery, Museo del Prado, has released an iOS app that allows you to peel away layers of famous paintings to uncover the intimate, and often frightening, secrets lurking beneath.

In 17th-century France, Charles Le Brun was as hot as any artist could be. He created work for the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris, for the Galerie d’Apollon in the Louvre, for Hôtel Lambert on Île St. Louis, for the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte and for much of Versailles. Louis XIV declared him “the greatest French artist of all time.” Whatever he produced made an impact.

Now, after a nail-biting three months for officials at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Le Brun’s presence will make a difference there, too.

To commemorate the upcoming holiday, the National Gallery in London has selected paintings from its collection that when viewed together, tell the story of Easter. Works by Rembrandt, Raphael, Michelangelo, Titian, Caravaggio, Diego Velázquez, and others recount the events leading up to Christ’s Crucifixion, which is known as the Passion, as well as his resurrection.

Located in Trafalgar Square, the National Gallery houses over 2,300 paintings from the 13th to the 19th centuries. Its collection belongs to the public of the UK. The museum is open seven days a week and offers free admission.

The Easter Story can also be viewed on the National Gallery’s website.

In an effort to expand its art collection’s global audience, Scotland will send a number of works on a tour of the United States. Pieces from the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art will travel to New York, San Francisco, and Fort Worth. The selected works will differ from city to city to best complement each museum’s permanent collection.

The tour will begin at the Frick Collection in New York on November 5, where 10 paintings will be exhibited, including Botticelli’s “The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child,” John Singer Sargent’s “Portrait of Lady Agnew of Lochnaw,” and Diego Velázquez’s “An Old Woman Cooking Eggs.” Following its time at the Frick, an expanded version of the show, which will feature 55 paintings, will head to the De Young Museum in San Francisco. The exhibition will make its final appearance at the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth.

The National Galleries of Scotland made a similar effort to expand their collection’s reach four years ago when they sent a prized Titian painting and other works to the High Museum of Art in Atlanta.

Madrid’s Museo Nacional del Prado is hosting the exhibition Velázquez and the Family of Philip IV, a survey of the artist’s time as a portraitist in the royal Spanish court of King Philip IV. Sponsored by the organization Fundacion AXA, the exhibition will feature 29 works from the last years of Diego Velázquez’s career.

Velázquez and the Family of Philip IV will be presented in chronological order, beginning in 1650 when the artist was working in Rome and executed about a dozen portraits of individuals associated with the papal court. The show then moves on to Velázquez’s return to Spain in 1651 after much insisting from King Philip IV, and continues until the artist’s death in 1660. The show includes a number of works by Velázquez’s successors, his son-in-law Juan Bautista Martínez del Mazo and Juan Carreño.

Velázquez and the Family of Philip IV will be on view at the Prado through February 9, 2014.