CODART, Dutch and Flemish art in museums worldwide

Splendor, Myth, and Vision: Nudes from the Prado

Exhibition: 11 June - 10 October 2016

The Clark Art Institute is the exclusive venue for Splendor, Myth, and Vision: Nudes from the Prado, featuring twenty-eight Old Master paintings from the Museo Nacional del Prado that celebrate the role of the nude in Western painting. Twenty-four of the paintings have never before been shown in America. This is a must-see exhibition for visitors to the Berkshires this summer.

Paintings portraying the nude occupied a fundamentally important role in early modern Europe. They feature prominently in the extraordinary collections assembled by Spanish monarchs in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Housed today in the Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, these collections reflect the cultural sensibilities and sophisticated artistic tastes of the rulers who assembled them—principally Philip II (reigned 1556–98) and his grandson Philip IV (reigned 1621–65).

The works presented in Splendor, Myth, and Vision are among the finest of the Prado’s unparalleled holdings, selected not only for their relationship to the exhibition’s themes, but also for their beauty and historical significance. Included in this sensuous exhibition are major paintings by Titian, Peter Paul Rubens, Jacopo Tintoretto, Diego Velázquez, Jan Brueghel the Elder, Guercino, Nicolas Poussin, Luca Giordano, Guido Reni, Jusepe de Ribera, and others.

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