Every era has its superpower.
For more than 300 years that power was Spain, a country so rich in the arts and sciences, so powerful on land and on sea, that its empire spanned continents and oceans.
The flowering of Spain’s golden age is dramatically on view in a new exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum. “Spain in the Age of Exploration, 1492-1819” provides a historical and cultural narrative of Spain’s vast reach as well as a display of more than 100 works, including:
Masterwork paintings, sculpture, prints, drawings and tapestries by such artists as Bosch, Titian, Rubens, Velezquez, Bernini and Goya.
Royal armor of extraordinary beauty created for men and their horses.
Rare maps, manuscripts, books and letters, such as a letter from Queen Isabella to Christopher Columbus written in 1493.
A stunning cache of navigational instruments used by Spanish explorers to such far-flung locales as our own Pacific Northwest.
Think Spain the next time you are heading for the San Juans, Fidalgo Island or the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Spanish explorers were here beginning in the 1770s, three decades before Lewis and Clark, exploring the coast as far north as Alaska. Rare Northwest Coast objects that Spanish explorers brought back from their journeys are on view here.
For all of these treasures we can thank many people, beginning with the Spanish royal family, the engine of Spain’s glory years for three centuries as patrons of the arts and sciences, promoters of the Roman Catholic religion and royalty with a thirst for discovery and exploration.
Many of the objects in the exhibit were drawn from those collections, which are now in the hands of the Patrimonio Nacional of Spain, a government agency that administers various state museums such as the Prado museum. In all, 16 Spanish and American museums and several private collectors loaned works for the show.
“This is a choice collection of the highest caliber … incredibly high artistically ” said Chiyo Ishikawa, SAM’s chief curator of collections and curator of European painting and culture, who is co-curator of the exhibition along with Javier Morales Vallejo of the Patrimonio Nacional in Madrid.
The exhibit explores four main themes: Image of Empire, Spirituality and Worldliness, Exchanges across Cultures, and Science and the Court. It’s arranged chronologically and begins with artifacts from the time of Columbus’ 1492 voyage, which was sponsored by Ferdinand and Isabel.
Subsequent galleries examine the rule of the Spanish Habsburgs, who expanded Spain’s global reach in the 16th and 17th centuries. The 17th century brought the French Bourbon dynasty and the period of the Enlightenment in which Spanish rulers promoted education and public policy and the advancement of scientific knowledge.
There’s a lot world history to absorb in this exhibit, which will be on view through Jan. 2, but the greatest pleasure comes in viewing the extraordinary works of art.
Among those objects are a sublime bronze Crucifix, circa 1656, by Italian sculptor Bernini; “Christ Bearing the Cross,” a painting by Hieronymus Bosch that shows Christ buckling under the weight of the cross; and portraits of Spanish royalty that depict them in regal splendor.
And the royal armor is stunning. Paintings of Spanish kings dressed in armor reside alongside the actual suits of armor shown in the portraits. And it’s amazing to see the equestrian armor, regally displayed on full-scale horse mannequins.
The glory that was, and is, Spain’s lives on in these treasures.
Seattle Art Museum photos
ABOVE: “Philip II,” circa 1557, oil on canvas by Anthony Mor
LEFT: “Maria Teresa Infanta of Spain,” 1651-1654, oil on canvas by Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velazquez
“Saint Ildefonso,” 1608-1614, oil on canvas by El Greco
Breastplate and backplate, Tlingit or Chugach (Pacific Yup’ik), collected circa 1775-1792, southeast Alaska, possibly by Bodega y Quadra Expedition, 1779; painted wood with leather and vegetable fiber.
“Spain in the Age of Exploration, 1492-1819”
Tuesdays through Sundays through Jan. 2, Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St., Seattle. 206-654-3100, www.seattleartmuseum.org.
“Spain in the Age of Exploration, 1492-1819”
Tuesdays through Sundays through Jan. 2, Seattle Art Museum, 100 University St., Seattle. 206-654-3100, www.seattleartmuseum.org.
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