Art to art

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Another wonderful day of art viewing in elegant Madrid. We went to the Museo Thyssen Bornemisza, a private collection which covers the entire development of Western art from pre-Renaissance until the end of 20th Century. It has examples of almost every big name you can think of - and often choice selections. We decided to work backwards and start with the most recent work, which turned out to be an excellent decision. Although the collection has strong pieces from every period we particularly liked the 20C selections. Our favourite room contained two Chagalls ( including the lovely warm Boy with Rooster) a Picasso harlequin, an awesome dreamy Dali, Magritte's witty Chef de Clamps, two Ernsts and two Tanguys! Talk about amazement overload. A special treat was an Ernst called Solitary and Conjugal Trees which I remembered seeing from a Thyssen exhibition that came to NZ when I was 15. (Two friends and I wagged school to see it - probably one of the smartest things I did in my school years, I'm sure I wouldn't have recalled whatever I would have learned at school 35 years later!) Other favourites included Picasso, Man with Clarinet and a couple of Kandinskys. The 19th C selections included heaps of impressionists, English and French Romantics and Dutch interiors. There was a particularly fine Degas (not normally a favourite of mine) and a powerful textured Van Gogh. Among the older works the highlight was Rubens Venus and Cupid, and we also loved a Rembrandt self-portrait and a Holbein of Henry VIII. The collection is overwhelmingly painting but there were several fabulous Rodin sculptures. Christ and the Magdalenreminded me of Michelangelo's unfinished Slaves working their way out of the block.

We finished our last day in Madrid with a relaxing stroll in the Parterre and a delightful dinner in the Plaza de Santa Ana.

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