Voces del Prado

There are many things in Velázquez that we can learn from

Rafael Moneo Vallés, Trustee and architect of the Jerónimos extension, 1994-Up to date

There are many things in Velázquez that we should learn from. This ranges from the sensation of the Baroque in terms of blurring the distinction between what is real and what is fiction, to the manner in which the painter applies a more or less conventional medium such as paint to a plane. Through Velázquez’s extraordinary skill, oil painting acquired an extreme degree of naturalness through the conventional media of the 16th and 17th centuries. And all this without permitting that skill to become a virtuoso spectacle. These are aspects that can be found in very few artists. I think what I have been saying has also been said by Antonio López García, a painter who has always uttered such profound truths about Velázquez, which means that there really are no superfluous works by Velázquez. This is one reason why Velázquez’s corpus is so small. There are no serial works. I’m also interested in the fact that we know so little about Velázquez. We know less about him than we probably know about Cervantes, even though Velázquez was a member of the Court. The feeling is that we have given such importance to his work that the person himself has remained in the background. The opposite so often occurs: the artist’s work is explained based on the person. Explaining Velázquez’s work based on the individual would require a complete literary invention. We really have a feeling that we are always dealing with – not a mystery exactly – but works whose interpretation eludes us, which may be why they always offer us something new, however much we look at them, visit them or attempt to understand them.