SPAIN: A royal display of art opened at the Prado museum this week, writes Jane Walker in Madrid
Spain had its own Sun King, Felipe IV, many years before his nephew and son-in-law, Louis XIV of France, adopted the nickname. On Wednesday the Prado museum in Madrid unveiled an exhibition of 62 works of art commissioned and collected by this Sun or Planet King to hang in his Buen Retiro palace.
Only last week the Army Museum, which has been housed in a wing of the Buen Retiro since the days of Franco, finally closed its doors. Its collection of military artefacts - described to me by one historian as "mere bric-a-brac" - will eventually move to the Alcazar in Toledo.
The Prado museum, which stands around the corner from the Buen Retiro, will gain much needed space to add to the major enlargement works currently under way which are expected to be completed by 2007.
The timing of the Prado's acquisition is fitting as not only does it coincide with the inauguration of the exhibition, but marks the 400th anniversary of the birth of King Philip IV. Philip built the Buen Retiro palace in 1630 as a pleasure palace to hang his paintings - he was the greatest royal patron and art collector in Spanish history - enjoy plays in his private theatre, stroll in his own gardens and zoo and entertain his courtiers in the Retiro park.
Unfortunately only part of the original palace complex remains today.
Much of it was destroyed during the Peninsular War when Napolean's troops used it as their barracks and it was bombarded by the Spanish and British forces. Fortunately more than 800 works from his collection survived, and many of them form part of the Prado's collection today.
The curators of the Planet King exhibition have re-created the five main rooms of the Buen Retiro Palace in the Prado, as they might have been during Philip IV's reign. All the works have been specially remounted in simple grey frames for this exhibit, to give them a uniformity.
The first room centres on the palace itself and the king who made it possible. A Jusepe Leonardo view of the Buen Retiro depicts the whole complex. This oil painting was used by designers to construct a scale model, with a cutaway showing the site of the hall of realms and the other buildings.
The Spanish master, Diego Velázquez, was not only Philip IV's court painter, he was also his agent who advised and bought paintings for the king. It is therefore fitting that two of his works - Philip IV as a hunter and his son Prince Baltasar Carlos in the riding school in the Buen Retiro - form part of the antechamber to the exhibition. In addition, there are 11 other Velázquez works in the show.
For the first time since they hung in the Buen Retiro, the 17 paintings of the ancient Rome series, many of which have been stored unseen in the Prado for decades, are being exhibited in one place. The ancient Rome series include works by the most popular artists of the day, such as Italian masters Lanfranco and Domenichino or the Spanish painter Jose de Ribera. The works depict the scenes and customs of ancient Rome such as emperors' funerals, circuses and gladiatorial fights.
Prof John Elliot, whose book on the Buen Retiro cowritten with Prof Jonathan Brown served as the inspiration for this exhibition, could not hide his delight at the results. "You can see how each artist was working to outdo one another, and how they seem to take on a new sense now they are hanging higher than usual," he said.
Eleven of the 12 battle scenes depicting military victories of Philip IV, which originally graced the main chamber of the Buen Retiro, have been recovered for the exhibition and now hang in the Prado. The 12th is missing.
Highlights of this series include Velazquez' outstanding Surrender of Breda, which Prof Elliot believes was painted specially for the Buen Retiro.
The Prado exhibition will run until the end of November