Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Pyrenean valleys boasting lavish masterpieces. However, by the nineteenth century many of
these churches had been ruined by renovations or lay abandoned, and not until 1919 was a
concerted effort made to preserve the frescoes for future generations, by removing them to a
museum where they could be better displayed.
Today, they are imaginatively presented in reconstructions of the original interiors, so you
can see exactly where the frescoes would have been placed in the church buildings. For the
most part they have a vibrant, raw quality, best exemplified by those taken from churches in
theBoívalleyintheCatalanPyrenees.Intheapseoftheearlytwelfth-centurychurchofSant
Climent in Taüll, the so-called
Master of Taüll
painted an extraordinarily powerful
Christ
in Majesty
, combining a Byzantine hierarchical composition with the imposing colours and
strong outlines of contemporary manuscript illuminators. Look out for details such as the
leper, to the left of the Sant Climent altar, patiently allowing a dog to lick his sores. Frescoes
from other churches explore a variety of themes, from heaven to hell, with the displays com-
plementedbysculptures,altarpanels,woodcarvings,religiousobjectsandfurnitureretrieved
from the mouldering churches themselves.
The Gothic collection
TheevolutionfromtheRomanesquetotheGothicperiodwasmarkedbyamovefrommurals
to painting on wood, and by the depiction of more naturalistic figures in scenes showing the
lives of the saints, and later in portraits of kings and patrons of the arts. In the early part
of the period, the Catalan and Valencian schools particularly were influenced by contempor-
ary Italian styles, and you'll see some outstanding altarpieces, tombs and church decoration.
Later began the International Gothic or “1400” style in which the influences became more
widespread; the important figures of this movement were the fifteenth-century artists
Jaume
Huguet
and
Lluís Dalmau
. Works from the end of this period show the strong influence of
contemporary Flemish painting, in the use of denser colours, the depiction of crowd scenes
and a concern for perspective. The last Catalan artist of note here is the so-called
Master
of La Seu d'Urgell
, represented by a number of works, including a fine series of six paint-
ings (Christ, the Virgin Mary, Sts Peter, Paul and Sebastian and Mary Magdalene) that once
formed the covers of an organ.
The Renaissance and Baroque collections
Manyofthe
Renaissance
and
Baroque
worksondisplayhavecomefromprivatecollections
bequeathedtothemuseum,notablybyconservativepoliticianFrancescCambóandMadrid's
Thyssen-Bornemisza.SelectionsfromthesebequestsratetheirownroomswithintheRenais-
sance and Baroque galleries, while the other rooms in this section trace artistic development
from the early sixteenth to the eighteenth century. Major European artists displayed include
PeterPaulRubens,GiovanniBattistaTiepolo,JeanHonoréFragonard,FranciscodeGoya,El
Greco, Francisco de Zurbarán and Diego Velázquez, though the museum is of course keen to
