UNDER REGISTRATION

  • JORGE BUSTOS

    Madrid

  • ANTONIO HEREDIA (PHOTOS)

Updated Friday,26May2023-23:24

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  • The archaeological remains of founding Madrid The first attraction of the Royal Collections Gallery
  • New urban space The metamorphosis (imminent) that awaits the old Cuesta de la Vega

They say that Madrid lacks an incontestable icon. It lacks a Roman amphitheater, a pointed iron tower, a suspension bridge over a mighty river or a bronze mermaid perched on a stone. But anyone who accesses the Campo del Moro by the Paseo de la Virgen del Puerto will stop looking for alternatives to the most eloquent and powerful image of the capital. There, dominating the west cornice that descends between the parterres of the garden to beyond the fountain of the

s Conchas, stands the millenary seat of the history of Madrid, which is that of Spain.

There the Arabs erected their founding fortress in the ninth century

, replaced by the Alcázar de los Austrias, replaced with the Bourbons by the largest royal palace in Western Europe.

If we shift our gaze to the right we will discover a rectangular mass, completed in 2015, which translates

The venerable granite of the ashlars of the palatial façade to the avant-garde language of contemporary architecture

. This second building, designed by the prestigious architects Emilio Tuñón and Luis Moreno Mansilla (who died in 2012), contrasts and rhymes with the first as a sign of historical respect. But not only tourists ignore their presence: too many Madrileños do not know that at that point the city is about to open to the public a monument that will turn Bailén Street into

a cultural pole capable of competing with the Prado-Recoletos axis

.

Find out more

Culture.

The Prado Museum, new and eternal: the art of returning

  • Editorial staff:

    JORGE BUSTOS

The Prado Museum, new and eternal: the art of returning

History.

Spain was born in 1248, when some locals settled in Seville.

  • Editorial staff:

    LUIS ALEMANY

    Madrid

Spain was born in 1248, when some locals settled in Seville.

The Gallery of the Royal Collections will inaugurate on June 28 a very Madrid paradox:

The most modern museum houses the most ancestral heritage

. To the point that visitors can face, through a huge glass arranged in the underground floor, with the oldest remains of the Arab wall. It is speculated that they are those of the door of the Sagra that gave access to the citadel and that nobody has moved from its place. With them Madrid was born and from them the

Strictly chronological criteria of the collection

: from Isabella the Catholic, conqueror of Nasrid Granada, to Alfonso XIII, last king who inhabited the Palacio de Oriente. The exhibition consists of about 650 pieces -of which a third will be subjected to constant rotation-, obtained from the huge funds of National Heritage.

"It wasn't about decapitalizing other museums or the Royal Sites. There is very little that we have brought from other collections and, in any case, they are loans. On the contrary: it is about promoting a shared notion of our culture, promoting knowledge of a common heritage and exhibiting valuable pieces that were gathering dust in warehouses or scattered around, "say Heritage sources, fleeing from controversies already overcome that affected the design of the collection and the opening calendar.

The Gallery of the Royal Collections

contains works by Titian, El Greco, Ribera, Giaquinto, Goya, Tiepolo or Paret

. Certainly the best paintings of the great masters collected by the Spanish monarchy will continue to be found.

in that unrivalled pinoteca that is the Prado Museum

. But only here can the visitor form a full idea of the

Everyday luxury

, of the sublime dictates of fashion, of the deep aesthetic impact that the dynastic change meant or of the exotic curiosities that have seduced the kings and queens of Spain for five centuries, throughout a good part of which global hegemony was exercised from Madrid. The attributes of such power are offered in the eyes of visitors as a generous aesthetic reflection of the Spanish position in the world.

We are therefore talking about a museum of works of art, but also of precious and useful singular objects. Any manifestation of imperial life was elevated to the highest aesthetic category: incalculable porcelains, richly embroidered chasubles, coral bucaros, cobbled caskets, a mother-of-pearl pianoforte,

the portable chirogym with which Elizabeth II trained her fingers for the piano

, a colossal golden planter or the dragon-shaped sleigh of Alfonso XII (possibly a gift from Tsar Alexander III). From the marble sample of Felipe V to a lavish carriage park, unique in the world, which allows you to compare the

austere ebonized walnut

of the carriage of Mariana of Austria with the undeserved splendor of the carriage of Fernando VII; the same one that

The absolutists towed, they say, anointed as acémilas to the cry of Viva las Cadenas

.

The walk through the Gallery guarantees amazement from the same access. The building is a sort of inverted skyscraper, like the hanging houses of Cuenca. The structure had to save the abrupt slope that goes down to the river from the Plaza de Oriente, and at the same time serve as

lateral buttress to the massive granite of the cathedral of La Almudena

. The first two rooms (floor -1 and floor -2) complete an exhibition area of 3,200 square meters that summarizes seven centuries of art history: from the fourteenth century to the present. The third floor (i.e. at least three) will be used for temporary exhibitions.

The first-time visitor will be somewhat surprised to cross the threshold that opens to one side of the viewpoint hovering over the Manzanares.

Because the sober exterior does not anticipate the surprise that awaits inside

. The spacious hall welcomes visitors and immerses them in a diaphanous, warm and deep environment.

Just the right light, the right temperature. A majestic panoramic view replicates Las Vistillas at the end of the long corridor

.

The combination of concrete, granite and oak in the windows reconciles minimalism and functionality with

A clear sense of oxygenated magnificence

. It will be some time before Spain can afford such an ambitious building. It has also concluded it by overcoming administrative and ideological gaps:

this museum was conceived by Azaña in the Second Republic, recovered by Aznar and continued by successive national governments

, regional and local -of different parties- until its expected launch within a month by Their Majesties and Pedro Sánchez. An example of country unity that perhaps only the best culture stripped of the worst politics is already able to offer.

The design of Tuñón y Mansilla benefits from a project originally designed as an exhibition space, unlike what happens with so many historical galleries that had to be conditioned, better or worse, for museum use. A clear pedagogical effort guides the entire route, guided by digital altarpieces strategically arranged on the landings of the wide staircase or by the thematic panels that

detail the specific meaning of royal residences

such as El Escorial, Aranjuez or La Granja. Patrimonio Nacional is concerned with familiarizing the Spanish or the foreigner with its noble mission, which crosses centuries and regimes to transmit, from generation to generation, the highest ideal of ourselves.

That magic mirror that was once reserved for a semi-divine elite and today belongs to the curious gaze of every citizen.

The monumental Solomonic columns of a lost hospital

. The Visigothic treasure of Guarrazar, from the seventh century. The Almodovarian size of

Saint Michael defeating the devil

, the work of Luisa Roldán, who sculpted her face in the victorious archangel and that of her husband in the subdued demon. The exquisite polyptych of Juan de Flandes in front of which Isabella of Castile prayed. The

Salome

by Caravaggio. A tapestry of Bosch. A gigantic fountain from the time of Charles V whose marble vase lived in a basement. The ephemeral architecture that Ventura Rodríguez executed for the Descalzas Reales, which was believed lost.

Or the wonderful Christ in bronze by Bernini that Velázquez brought from Rome

, along with the original model of the fountain of the Four Rivers. These are just some of the wonders waiting to be admired.

But one of the greatest successes of the project is

The integration of nature into the experience of the visit

. The opening to the public of two new entrances to the Gallery through both ends of the garden will allow tourists not to collapse the area – an elevator the size of a terraced chalet will lead them from the parking lot where the bus will leave them to the same rooms – while enjoying that masterpiece of the

English landscaping

which is the Campo del Moro.

That's where Madrid started. There began a story that should be rescued, restored and exhibited. Like the man in Borges' story,

The Spanish monarchs set themselves the task of covering the world

. Over the years they populated the maps with images of provinces, kingdoms, mountains, bays, ships, islands, fish, habitations, instruments, stars, horses and people, without suspecting that this patient labyrinth of lines traced not only the image of their face, but the destiny of their people.

Madrileños from all over Spain, Spaniards from all over Madrid will soon enjoy a new

Space of concord, recognition and beauty

where to learn everything that was and everything that -for that reason- will never cease to be at all.