On Saturday afternoon a portrait of Carlos V Painted by John Pantoja de la Cruzcoming from the Kremlin museums, where it was to be part of an exhibition that was supposed to open on March 3, but was cancelled, following the invasion of Ukraine on February 24. It is one of the international loans that were trapped in the cellars of Russian museums. In addition, they had given eight pieces from the Royal Palace Armory. The return trip from the works was made by truck from Moscow, via Saint Petersburg and Helsinki, until its return to Spain.
to which the museum he directed between 1896 and 1898 dedicates a small tribute to him in the centenary of his death. In reality, the anniversary was commemorated in November 2021, but because Zaragoza then organized an exhibition that included loans from the Prado, he did not want to interfere and it was agreed to postpone it until now. When the installation of the 19th century collection in the Villanueva building was renovated, at the end of the tour it was left a small room, the 60, to exhibit, on a rotating basis, works that are not usually exhibited. The Prado hoards some 2,700 from the XIX, half of its total funds.
On this occasion, the exhibition, ‘Francisco Pradilla (1848-1921), splendor and decline of history painting in Spain’, sponsored by Ramón y Caja Abogados, brings together, until October 23eight squares, to which are added in the room 75 his great masterpiece, ‘Dona Juana la Loca’and his most finished sketch (dedicated to José Casado del Alisal, then director of the Spanish Academy in Rome), acquired a few years ago, both from 1877. The imposing canvas, measuring 3.40 by 5 meters, was awarded the Medal of Honor, highest award, at the National Exhibition in Madrid and at the International Exhibition in Paris in 1878. They highlighted his mastery of perspective, his sense of rhythm, the balance of the composition, the scenographic use of space, the realistic treatment of the figures and the landscape, as well as its documentary rigor.
The exhibition starts with a work recently donated by Juan Pablo Montserrat, patron of the Prado, who acquired it at auction and is exhibiting it for the first time. It is ‘The corpse of Beatriz de Cenci exposed on Sant’Angelo bridge’, a copy made by Pradilla in 1871 of a painting by Lorenzo Vallés, which was almost destroyed in a fire at the Ministry of Public Works and which we know about thanks to a photograph of Laurent. With this work, he explains Javier Baron, head of the 19th century Painting Conservation at the Prado and curator of the exhibition, Pradilla began in history painting, the most valued pictorial genre in our country between 1856 and 1890. Next to him, a small canvas, 25 by 40 centimeters, ‘Doña Juana la Loca en los adarves del Castillo de la Mota’, acquired with funds from the Carmen Sánchez legacy, which was Pradilla’s first thought on a matter that would give him international fame. He painted it in 1876. For him he looks at Rosales. He also hangs in the room a copy of the final canvas etched by Bartolomé Maura y Montaner in 1881.
Along with his most famous canvas, ‘Doña Juana la Loca’, Francisco Pradilla’s other most recognized work is ‘The Surrender of Grenada’, which treasures the Senate in the Hall of Lost Steps and is also a jewel of history painting. However, the Prado has a preparatory study taken from life for the Boabdil’s horse (‘Count Bobrinski’s Arabian Horse’, from 1880), present in the exhibition. Already in the 20th century, between 1906 and 1910, the decline of history painting, which goes out of fashion, due, according to Javier Barón, to the irruption of social painting, post-impressionism and avant-garde movements such as cubism. Despite this, Pradilla painted works of great quality such as ‘The Queen Doña Juana la Loca, secluded in Tordesillas with her daughter, the Infanta Doña Catalina’ (1906) and ‘Courtship of the baptism of Prince Don Juan, son of the Catholic Monarchs, through the streets of Seville’ (1910). Both were commissioned by the Basque businessman Luis de Ocharan. The exhibition is completed with an example of his mastery in watercolor (‘Marino Faliero, Dux LV’, from 1883), where he follows in the footsteps of Mariano Fortuny -they both met in Rome-, and A self-portrait de Pradilla, already old and tired, from 1917.
Javier Barón emphasizes that Pradilla was a very gifted painter and a great virtuosityfascinated by the past, with a melancholy and nostalgic lookwho is attracted to figures of conscience misfortunea, such as Juana la Loca herself, Blanca de Navarra or the Prince of Viana. But he denies that there is any political charge or connotations in his history paintings: «he was the great history painter of the 19th century in Spain».