Voces del Prado

A way in the world

Inmaculada Echeverría Elvira, Head of the Technical Documentation and Laboratory Section, 1985-2024

I think it will be very hard to leave the Museum. It's complicated because the Museum draws you in and you virtually have a second family in here, in many cases your direct family. I get thrown back by the idea of retiring because I like it here and I think I could go on working this way if nothing strange occurs. I would like to continue but life changes a lot. One of the things I find most painful are the people you lose because they retire, it's not easy for me.
The large breakfast tables, where we spoke of work and so many other things, they are getting smaller. Often in a happy way, because people retire, they have another life and they're doing fine, and we keep up the relationship. But one thing I see in people who come back after retiring is that they feel a little out of place... That's what I don't want, but it will inevitably happen sometime.
The opportunity of meeting and relating with different people here, all of them related to the history of art, without whom the paintings would not be up on the wall, the lighting wouldn't be in place, we wouldn't be able to do our job... The even-layered relationship with all the staff in here, that is something essential for me.