The exhibition Mythological Passions, which will be on display in Room C of the Jerónimos Building from 2 March to 4 July with the sole sponsorship of Fundación BBVA, offers a unique opportunity to see one of the greatest groups of mythological paintings created in Europe in the 16^th and 17^th century.

Organised by the Museo Nacional del Prado, the National Gallery and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and curated by Miguel Falomir, Director of the Museo del Prado, and Alejandro Vergara, Chief Curator of Flemish and Northern Schools Painting at the Museo del Prado, the exhibition offers a survey of mythological love through the work of the greatest figures of European painting, represented by a total of 29 works.

“La obra invitada”, programa patrocinado por la Fundación Amigos Museo del Prado, presenta el Biombo de la Conquista de México, pieza capital del arte virreinal.

Este biombo refleja el ideario de las élites criollas de la capital de la Nueva España y visualiza su relación con una Monarquía Hispánica a la que debían fidelidad política y el origen de su fe, pero también el orgullo y la singularidad de una realidad americana que cristalizaría más de un siglo después en el proceso de independencia.

Expuesta en la sala 16 A del edificio Villanueva hasta el próximo 26 de septiembre, esta excepcional pieza pasará a formar parte de la exposición temporal Tornaviaje, una apuesta del Prado por abrir sus colecciones a nuevas geografías.

Marinus: Painter from Reymerswale, on display in Room D of the Jerónimos Building from 9 March to 13 June with the sponsorship of Mitsubishi Corporation and the Fundación Amigos del Museo del Prado, is the first monographic exhibition to be organised on this Netherlandish artist who worked in the first half of the 16^th century. While many of his paintings are very well known and appreciated today from textbooks on economic history - the Flemish economic historian Raymond de Roover (1904-1972) was one of the first to associate money changers with the profession of banking in the 16^th century and to illustrate them in his books - the artist’s life and work have been little studied in recent decades.

The bequest made by Carmen Sánchez García (1929-2016) to the Museo del Prado has allowed for the acquisition of numerous paintings that reflect her desire to leave much of her estate “for the acquisition and restoration of paintings in particular”. This exhibition will pay tribute to this benefactor of the Museum by presenting a selection of the acquisitions made possible by her generosity.

A teacher by profession, Carmen Sánchez García was associated with the Colegio Nervión from almost the outset of her career. A Friend of the Fundación Amigos del Museo del Prado since 2003, she was a regular participant in the Museum’s courses and educational activities.

El 19 de noviembre de 1819 el rey Fernando VII inauguraba el Museo Real de Pinturas. Dos siglos después, el actual Museo Nacional del Prado, inaugura una nueva sala en su exposición permanente, que presenta un recorrido por la historia de la institución. Esta muestra toma como hilo conductor la evolución de su arquitectura, y, a la vez, reflexiona sobre las vicisitudes históricas y políticas que han transformado el museo en la institución pública de relevancia internacional que es hoy, así como sobre su imagen pública, su personal, sus publicaciones e investigaciones y sus principales exposiciones y actividades.

El recorrido, organizado en nueve secciones cronológicas, se inicia a finales del siglo XVIII, con el proyecto de Juan de Villanueva para sede de la Academia de Ciencias Naturales y Gabinete de Historia Natural, y finaliza con el proyecto de rehabilitación del Salón de Reinos de Foster & Rubio, que culminará el Campus Prado.

The Museo del Prado is reopening with a spectacular new installation of its permanent collection.

The Central Gallery, an extensive architectural space flooded with natural light, now becomes the principal axis for this new hanging which includes the majority of the collection’s most iconic works, offering a unique and unprecedented experience.

“Reunited” remains on view until 25 July and has involved the relocation of more than 190 works. It evokes the type of display that existed when the Museo del Prado first opened to the public.

Among the initiatives to celebrate the Museum’s Bicentenary, and with the title “Audiovisual memory of the Museo del Prado”, a new documentary archive brings together the audiovisual history of the Museum – its buildings and collections – for the first time through film, NODO news bulletins and television. This selection of audiovisual material, which will come to number more than 400 items over the course of 2019, offers a survey of more than 100 years of images of the Prado.

In collaboration with the Filmoteca and Radio Televisión Española (RTVE), the archive starts with 300 titles, including a previously unseen documentary entitled “Introduction to the Museo del Prado” (1985) by Basilio Martín Patino, the RTVE series “Looking at a painting” with contributions from figures such as Alberti, Cela and Umbral, and full-length cinema films with actors such as Rita Hayworth, Rex Harrison, Tony Leblanc, Aurora Bautista and Concha Velasco, directed by Ramón Masats, Antonio Mercero, Jacinto Molina, Orson Welles and George Marshall, among others.

Spoken history through the experience of the people who have devoted their day to day to the institution.

Thanks to the support of Telefónica as a Benefactor Sponsor of the Visitor Services and other Users improvement programme, the Museo del Prado is now the first Spanish museum and one of the few in the world to make its historical archive available online. By doing so it is leading the way in free access to information by making it possible to consult both its collection of works of art and the contents of its archive online.

This initiative offers nearly 12,000 digitalised documents, including: the Museum’s ground plan and elevation; the list of the paintings on display in the Sala Francesa in 1887; the appointment of Pablo Picasso as the Prado’s director in 1936; and the personal archives of the Madrazo family, of Valentín Carderera, one of the leading figures in the Spanish 19^th-century art world, and of Salvador Viniegra, deputy director of the Museum between 1890 and 1898.