Voces del Prado

What the Prado taught me

Felipe Garín Llombart, Museum Director, 1991-1993

My father was a Professor of History of Art and it's something I've known about since I was a child. In spite of that, I studied Philosophy and Literature and I also studied Law, and I wanted to take up the legal profession, until my father showed me that my best grades had come in subjects that were not strictly legal but closer to History. History of Law, Natural Law, Public Law. etc. In the end, I who aspired to become a prosecutor opted to a position as curator at the Valencia Museum. I studied for two months, won the position and was invited to become a part of the Museum.
In my life with Museums there have been stages in which I have furthered my training: at the Museum of Fine Arts of Valencia, then I was appointed Director of the Museum of Ceramics of Valencia when González Martí died. The Prado leads to a reflection on everything before it and you think about everything you have been and done. Up until my retirement I have been an active professor, to the extent my posts allowed me to teach, and I enjoy cultural and administrative management, thanks to my Law training.
I get upset when I listen to people saying they know nothing about management. When you are at a place such as a museum, you need to be able to distinguish clearly between Chapter Two, Chapter One and Chapter Four and what you have to say before a given date, you have to draft the preliminary budget before the proper budget … I think management is essential for a museum to operate properly. I am obsessed with management, a Museum Director must move around in the fields of science and management and has to negotiate and speak with the media so that the Museum is sufficiently fluid in a world in which we are always subject to scrutiny by the media.