Delacroix arrives to Spain

CaixaForum Madrid, in collaboration with the Louvre Museum,  hosts the most important exhibition to be devoted to the Romantic painter Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863) in the last fifty years.

Following its presentation in Madrid, the show will travel to Barcelona, where it will open to the public in February next year where it will stand side-by-side in the Catalan capital with a second major exhibition, this one devoted to Francisco de Goya and based on works from the Prado in Madrid. This coincidence will help to suggest links between the two artists, both, undeniably, precursors of modernity whose respective careers also shared various points in common.

This show, in which CaixaForum Madrid pays homage to a truly great French artist, is the most complete organised since the major exhibition staged in Paris to mark the centenary of Delacroix's death in 1963, and try to make new audiences more aware of the French painter's relations with Spain.

A major retrospective, the show seeks to provide an overview of Delacroix's work and his artistic development. In pursuing this goal, it focuses on the different stages in the French painter’s career, from his early works, when he found his inspiration in the museum, to his mature years, when he revisited his earlier themes from a new perspective, with particular emphasis on his paintings of historical and oriental inspiration.

Delacroix (1798-1863) brings together more than 130 works that illustrate the many facets in the work of this genius. As a result, visitors to CaixaForum Madrid will be able to see some of his best-known oils, such as Greece Dying on the Ruins of Missolonghi, as well as a sketch for the Death of Sardanapalus and Women of Algiers in their Apartment, exceptionally loaned for this show. This last work will, moreover, provide the centerpiece for one of the highlights of the show, a section featuring all the great paintings of oriental inspiration that the French master produced on his return from his journey to North Africa.

These renowned paintings are also accompanied by less well-known pieces, with particular emphasis on the graphic work, including both drawings and etchings (which also owe a major debt to Goya).

Date: until  January 15.
Location: CaixaForum Madrid. Paseo del Prado, 36. 28014 Madrid. (Spain).
Hours: from Monday to Sunday, from 10am to 8pm.

See some of Delacroix's works in the following video and slideshow: