Romantic visionaries in Madrid
From March 16 to May 21, an exceptional exhibition of 62 works brings together Norwegian and Spanish artists of the 19th century for the first time at the Lázaro Galdiano Museum in Madrid.
The canvases of Peder Balke, Lars Hertervig and Eugenio Lucas Velasquez are presented in resonance with other landscape painters such as Caspar David Friedrich, William Turner or even, and more surprisingly, Victor Hugo.
This exhibition is organized by the Lázaro Galdiano Museum, the Center for European Studies Hispánica (CEEH), the Kunstmuseum of Stavanger and the Nordic Institute of Art (NIA).
In the museum's Pardo Bazán room, one can admire the mysterious arctic landscapes of Peder Balke, one of the first painters to venture into the Far North, the imaginative and captivating visions of heaven and earth by Lars Hertervig and the canvases, washes and drawings by Eugenio Lucas Velázquez, with his imaginary landscapes resulting from his particular stain-based technique, with which he experiments with a nascent abstraction.
Balke, Lucas and Hertervig jointly contribute to shedding new light on the phenomenon of the visionary romantics in the history of international art.
These three painters, supporters of the romantic tradition, focused at one point in their life on the landscape, developing their own style and way of painting.
“These works are not just naturalistic representations, but landscapes of the mind: they were visionary artists. It's the way they treated patterns, a meeting point between theme and form, which makes them particularly interesting", emphasizes Knut Ljøgodt, director of the Nordic Institute of Art.
The exhibition shows how, without knowing each other but with a common sensitivity and the same desire for innovation, these three painters shaped their inner visions of nature using experimental formats and techniques. They thus anticipated, in a way, the loose way of painting of Impressionism and other modern artistic movements.
Calle Serrano 122
28006 Madrid
España
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