Celebrating the Prado: A Day of Special Events at the National Gallery, London, 30 September 2019

The National Gallery will celebrate the 200th anniversary of Spain’s foremost artistic institution, the Museo del Prado in Madrid, with a day of special events. Read below or click here to discover what’s on.

In conversation: Celebrating 200 years of the Prado

Lunchtime talk, Sainsbury Wing Theatre, National Gallery, London, Monday 30 September 2019, 1–1.45pm

Miguel Falomir © Archivo Fotográfico. Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid

Discover Madrid’s Prado Museum: past, present and future. Miguel Falomir, Director of the Prado Museum, Madrid, joins Gabriele Finaldi, Director of the National Gallery, to discuss the history and dynamic future of Spain’s most eminent art museum, which celebrates its bicentenary this year.

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Picasso and the Prado

Lunchtime talk, Sainsbury Wing Theatre, National Gallery, London, Monday 30 September 2019, 2–2.45pm

The Prado Museum in Madrid held a special place in Picasso’s heart and mind. As a young artist he visited the museum many times, drawn to the world of El Greco and Velázquez. Later, in 1936, the Spanish Republic awarded him the title of Honorary Director-in-Exile of the Prado Museum in gratitude for his support. In 1957 he created a series of 58 variations of Velázquez’s ‘Las Meninas’, the iconic work in the Prado. Art historian Gijs van Hensbergen tells the story of Picasso’s life-long relationship with the Prado.

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Black and light: Discover the mystique of the Prado Museum by night

Film Screening and Q&A, Sainsbury Wing Theatre, National Gallery, London, Monday 30 September 2019, 3–5.20pm

Join award-winning film-maker Álvaro Perdices for a screening of his stunning 2015 film ‘Negro y Luz’, an artistic essay on darkness and light exploring the Prado Museum at night.

3 pm Introduction to the film with Álvaro Pedrices
3.10 pm Film showing of Negro y Luz (2015)
5.30 pm Q&A with Álvaro Perdices
5.40 pm Close

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Closing Soon: Balenciaga and Spanish Painting, Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, until 22 September 2019

Francisco de Zurbarán
Saint Casilda, ca. 1635
Oil on canvas. 171 x 107 cm
© Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

The Spanish fashion designer’s approach to his designs was informed by his lifelong love of art sparked by his youthful admiration of the paintings owned by clients of his seamstress mother, in particular the Marquis and Marchioness of Casa Torres, who spent their summers in the Palacio Aldamar (also known as Vista Ona) in Getaría. Three of the paintings on display in this exhibition, and loaned by the Prado, were in that collection: Head of an Apostle by Velázquez; Saint Sebastian by El Greco; and Cardinal Luis María de Borbón y Vallabriga by Goya. The latter establishes a dialogue with a magnificent red dress suit with a short jacket loaned from the Museo del Traje in Madrid. Balenciaga frequently drew on the heritage of his Spanish homeland, going further than adding flamenco ruffles to his dresses and seeking inspiration by re-imagining bull fighters’ jackets. The exhibition explores the influence of four centuries of Spanish painting on the couturier’s work. Zurbarán was one inspiration, his drapery influencing Balenciaga’s bold sashes. In 1939 Velázquez’s portraits of the Infanta Magarita were reinterpreted by the dress designer’s work. Also notable is the interaction between a spectacular blue silk evening gown and cape and the mantle of the same colour seen in The Immaculate Conception by Murillo from the Arango collection. The curator Eloy Martínez de la Pera, has drawn together some 90 examples of Balenciaga’s work alongside 55 paintings, including works by El Greco, Murillo, Goya and the nineteenth-century artist Antonio María Esquivel. Paintings have been lent by the Prado, Bilbao, Seville and Valencia and costumes, some of which have never been displayed before and designs have been lent by the Balenciaga Museum in his hometown in Getaría, and archives in Paris. The exhibition also explores the impact of Philip II’s court making the use of black fashionable for clothing throughout Europe, and how Balenciaga chose to transform it in his own way. As the magazine Harper’s Bazaar wrote in 1938: “at the new Spanish house Balenciaga [in Paris] the black is so black that it hits you like a blow. Thick Spanish black, almost velvety, a night without stars, which makes the ordinary black seem almost grey.”

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Thoma Foundation Grants in Spanish Colonial Art, deadline 25 October 2019

MARILYNN THOMA FELLOWSHIP IN SPANISH COLONIAL ART

The Carl & Marilynn Thoma Art Foundation offers Pre-doctoral and Post-doctoral fellowships annually in support of projects and research initiatives that will advance the field of Spanish colonial art. The Marilynn Thoma Fellowship is the only unrestricted research funding in the United States devoted exclusively to the field of Spanish Colonial art. Scholars may come from any discipline, but all projects must relate to the study of art and art history. Exceptionally accomplished scholars holding an MA may also apply. International scholars, particularly from Latin America, are strongly encouraged to apply.

Applicants should propose projects that exhibit original scholarship and/or will make a significant contribution to the understanding of colonial Spanish American art and its history. Fellowships range in duration from one to two years, and eventuate in major measurable outcomes, including museum exhibitions, dissertations, book publications, scholarly essays, and lecture series. Projects will be considered from all of Spanish colonial Latin America and the Caribbean, however the Foundation will give strong preference to projects that make specific contributions to the history of painting and sculpture in colonial South America.

Pre-doctoral Dissertation Research Fellowship–$45,000 (1–year award)

Post-doctoral Fellowship–$60,000/year (1–2 year award; indicate project length in application)
*Applicants should hold a PhD conferred between 2009-2019

Applications are open from May 15 to October 25, 2019. Click here for more information.

THOMA FOUNDATION RESEARCH AND TRAVEL AWARDS IN SPANISH COLONIAL ART

Congruent with the Marilynn Thoma Fellowship, the Thoma Foundation offers annual grants to scholars, curators, art historians and advanced graduate students working on MA or PhD dissertations in support of projects and research initiatives that will advance the field of colonial art of Spanish America. These grants are meant to help defray the costs of research-related expenses. Funding is provided each year to several scholars selected by an international jury of undisclosed experts in the field, with travel commencing within one year + one month from the date of notification.

Grants of up to $25,000 are available for projects lasting up to six months.

Applications are open from May 15 to October 25, 2019. Click here for more information.

Click here for the Thoma Foundation website

Lecture: ‘Bartolomé Bermejo. Master of the Spanish Renaissance’, by Akemi Herráez Vossbrink, Conference Room 1, National Gallery, London, 4 September 2019, 2:30–3:30pm

ARTES committee member Akemi Herráez Vossbrink, assistant curator of the exhibition “Bartolomé Bermejo. Master of the Spanish Renaissance” at The National Gallery, will give a lecture on the life and works of this Spanish painter.

Bartolomé Bermejo was a fifteenth-century Spanish artist whose painting technique, mixing Spanish and Netherlandish features, was unparalleled amongst his Iberian contemporaries. He had a limited output of less than twenty paintings of which seven are featured in the current National Gallery exhibition. This is the first time that six of these paintings are shown in the UK and the restoration of the National Gallery’s painting of Saint Michael Triumphs over the Devil (1468) has enabled the Gallery to showcase Bermejo’s earliest masterpiece. Following the two major Bermejo retrospectives at the Prado Museum and the MNAC (Barcelona), this exhibition features paintings ranging from different periods of Bermejo’s career demonstrating his development as he moved throughout the Crown of Aragon (mostly encompassing territories in eastern Spain). This talk will focus on the seven paintings shown in the exhibition considering them within their context and retracing Bermejo’s artistic career. Bermejo’s Saint Michael, the Acqui Terme triptych and the Desplà Pietà (reproduced above), will receive special attention in the lecture, which will compare their donors, production, intended location and historical context.

This event is for a general audience and is organised by the Instituto Cervantes — London. Free, reistration required. Click here to register.

Featured Exhibition: Balenciaga, Shaping Fashion, Bendigo Art Gallery, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, until 10 November 2019

A version of the V&A’s exhibition Balenciaga, Shaping Fashion is now showing at the Bendigo Art Gallery, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia, until 10 November 2019. The Spanish couturier, whose female dress and master tailoring was admired by Coco Chanel and Christian Dior, was one of the most innovative and influential fashion designers of the 20th century. The Australian exhibition shows highlights of the V&A’s display including garments crafted by Balenciaga from the 1950s and 1960s—arguably the most creative period of his career, when he dressed some of the most renowned women of the time—through to pieces designed by protégés and contemporary designers working in the same innovative way today. The exhibition features examples of Balenciaga’s revolutionary shapes—the tunic, sack, baby doll and shift dresses—all of which remain style staples today, and marks the centenary of the opening of Balenciaga’s first fashion house in San Sebastian, and the 80th anniversary of the opening of his famous fashion house in Paris.

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Featured Exhibition: ‘De Mena, Murillo, Zurbarán. Masters of the Spanish Baroque’, Sint-Janshospitaal, Bruges, until 6 October and MNHA, Luxembourg, 24 January–07 June 2020

20 works of Spanish religious sculpture and painting are currently on display in the monumental wards of the ancient hospital of Bruges. It is a rare opportunity to become acquainted with some lesser-known aspects of Spain’s Golden Age. The highlight of the exhibition, in addition to paintings by famous Spanish masters like Murillo and Zurbaran, is a group of six hyper-realistic sculptures by the greatest sculptor of the Spanish Baroque, Pedro de Mena.
This project is in collaboration with the Luxemburg Musée National d’Histoire et d’Art and the exhibition will travel to this museum in 2020.
The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue in English, with texts by Ruud Priem, Sibylla Goegebuer, Malgorzata Nowara, Gilles Zeimat, and Noël Geirnaert. Click here for more information on the exhibition and here for the catalogue.

News on Journals: Latin American and Latinx Visual Culture/Metropolitan Museum Journal

Latin American and Latinx Visual Culture is a quarterly peer-reviewed journal dedicated to publishing the most current international research on the visual culture of Mexico, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean, as well as that created in diaspora. A defining focus of the journal is its concentration of current scholarship on both Latin American and Latinx visual culture in a single publication. The journal aims to approach ancient, colonial, modern and contemporary Latin American and Latinx visual culture from a range of interdisciplinary methodologies and perspectives. The journal was first published in January 2019, and three issues are now available on the journal’s website.

The Metropolitan Museum Journal presents richly illustrated studies of works in the Museum’s collection, including prominent as well as lesser known pieces, and relating them to works in other collections. The journal’s editorial board has recently announced that starting with volume 55, authors who publish in the Metropolitan Museum Journal (MMJ) will no longer be responsible to provide or pay for high-resolution images. The editorial office at the Metropolitan Museum of Art will acquire all high-resolution images and obtain English-language, world publication rights for print and electronic editions of MMJ. Journal authors will no longer need to spend time and effort on securing images. Click here for more information on this innovative policy.

Edilia and François-Auguste de Montêquin Fellowship, Society of Architectural Historians, deadline September 30, 2019

Purpose
This award provides support for travel related to research on Spanish, Portuguese, or Ibero-American architecture.

The Awards
The awards consist of a $2,000 fellowship for an advanced graduate student and a $6,000 fellowship for a senior or emerging scholar. The awardees will be notified in December and will be recognized at the SAH 73rd Annual International Conference in Seattle, Washington (April 29–May 2, 2020). The awards also will be announced in the May 2020 issue of the SAH Newsletter.

Criteria for Application

These annual fellowships are intended to support the research of graduate students who have completed their coursework and are engaged in doctoral dissertation research, and senior or emerging scholars who have completed their PhD or equivalent terminal degree. The research to be supported must focus on Spanish, Portuguese, or Ibero-American architecture, including colonial architecture produced by the Spaniards in the Philippines and what is today the United States. The applicant must be a current member of SAH.

Reporting Requirements
Following completion of travel and research supported by the fellowship, each de Montêquin Fellowship awardee must submit a written report summarizing their research and explaining what travel was undertaken and how funds were spent. The report will be submitted to the SAH office no later than three months following the completion of work related to the fellowship. Awardees are required to upload images to SAHARA (a minimum of 50 for junior scholars and a minimum of 150 for senior scholars).

Application Details
You will need two recommendations to apply for this fellowship, a description of the research project on Iberian or Ibero-American architecture to be funded (500 words maximum), a current curriculum vitae (5 pages max), and a statement of purpose.

SAH is accepting applications for the 2020 Edilia and François-Auguste de Montêquin Fellowship. The application deadline is September 30, 2019.

Visit sah.org/research-fellowships to apply.

Featured Exhibition: Thoughts on Portraiture, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, 3 August–18 November 2019

A free one-room show which draws on Birmingham’s collection of modern and contemporary art to explore how artists have used a wide range of styles and imagery to interpret complex human emotion and experiences. The display is centred around the sculpted polychrome group Man and His Sheep (1989) by the Brazilian-born artist Ana Maria Pacheco, which has not been on show for over five years. The striking installation consists of eight lifelike carved wooden figures arranged in a procession. Each imposing figure is carved from a single piece of limewood then painted and waxed to give a startling lifelike appearance, enhanced by their onyx eyes and acrylic teeth, which add a somewhat sinister expression. Pacheco’s oil painting In Illo Tempore I (1994) is also on display. The display also includes two Picasso etchings from the Vollard Suite. Winged Bull Watched by Four Children (1934) shows a monstrous mythological beast, whilst Portrait of Vollard (1937) uses lighter and darker shades to depict different characteristics of Ambroise Vollard, the art dealer who commissioned the Suite of prints. For conservation reasons neither of these works on paper are likely to be on display again soon. Other artists whose portraits are featured in the exhibition include a self-portrait by the Birmingham-born David Bomberg and Frank Auerbach’s etching of his friend the art historian Michael Podro.
Click here for more information.

Pre- and Post-Doctoral Fellowships at the Meadows Museum, Dallas, Texas

Center for Spain in America (CSA) Curatorial Fellowship

Pre-doctoral fellowships are supported by the Center for Spain in America (CSA). The Centro de Estudios Europa Hispánica (CEEH) and the Center for Spain in America (CSA) encourage studies on Spanish history, art and literature by establishing doctoral and postdoctoral scholarships at European and American universities, as well as at research centers whose holdings are particularly relevant to the knowledge of Spanish culture. They likewise establish assistantships for curatorial work at museums with significant holdings of Spanish painting.

Requirements:

Pre-doctoral students who have completed their course work
At least one year of curatorial experience in an art museum; demonstrated knowledge in the field of Spanish art; proficient in Spanish (reading, writing, and speaking).
Is appointed by and reports to the director and curatorial staff of the Meadows Museum.
Serves a full-time appointment of one year, beginning in September 2020.
Performs curatorial research and is responsible for projects as assigned.
Travel stipend for research as well as trips to Spain and other destinations as directed by the museum director to perform research and project-based assignments.

Applicants must submit:

A full résumé
Three letters of recommendation
A statement (not to exceed 1500 words) specifying:
- 1) the applicant’s research goals;
- 2) how these goals relate to or will benefit the Meadows Museum; and
- 3) how resources at the Meadows Museum, Southern Methodist University and travel related research might be used to accomplish those goals.
Applications and letters of recommendation must be received by November 22, 2019. Electronic submissions will not be accepted.

Mail to:

Anne Kindseth
Interim Director of Education
Meadows Museum
P.O. Box 750357
Dallas, Texas 75275-0357

For more information, please contact: akindseth@smu.edu

Mellon Curatorial Fellowship

Post-doctoral fellowships are supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which seeks to strengthen, promote, and defend the centrality of the humanities and the arts to human flourishing and to the well-being of diverse, fair, and democratic societies. To this end, its core programs support exemplary and inspiring institutions of higher education and culture.

Requirements:

Post-doctoral students who have earned their Ph.D. within the last five years
At least one year of curatorial experience in an art museum; demonstrated knowledge in the field of Spanish art; proficient in Spanish (reading, writing, and speaking).
Is appointed by and reports to the director and curatorial staff of the Meadows Museum.
Serves a full-time appointment of two years, beginning in September 2020.
Performs curatorial research and is responsible for projects as assigned.
Travel stipend for research as well as trips to Spain and other destinations as directed by the museum director to perform research and project-based assignments.
Author a scholarly article for publication and present at least two public lectures, as well as actively participate in the research and organization of special exhibitions or projects.
Culminate fellowship by organizing a scholarly, international, two-day colloquium focusing on new research in Spanish art history.

Applicants must submit:

A full résumé
Three letters of recommendation
A statement (not to exceed 1500 words) specifying:
- 1) the applicant’s research goals;
- 2) how these goals relate to or will benefit the Meadows Museum; and
- 3) how resources at the Meadows Museum, Southern Methodist University and travel related research might be used to accomplish those goals.
Applications and letters of recommendation must be received by November 22, 2019. Electronic submissions will not be accepted.

Click here for more information