In the Italian Manner. Spain and the Mediterranean Gothic (1320-1420)

The Prado Museum will host an exhibition from 26 May to 20 September, which seeks to bring a fascinating artistic period closer by highlighting the use of technique as a means of expression in luxury works.  A selection of more than one hundred works in diverse techniques will be on display alongside creations by Italian maestros, such as Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Gherardo Starnina or Lupo di Francesco.

It is difficult to understand the artistic landscape of the late Middle Ages in Spain without considering Italy. The arrival of artists and the import of works gave rise to Trecento aesthetic, technical and iconographic innovations which left a deep mark on the visual culture of the Iberian kingdoms.  Local maestros also contributed to this evolution, creating original variations on the Italian models. Their technical and material sophistication combined with their ability to create new, formal, typological and thematic proposals fascinated the most refined viewers of the time.

The two shores of the western Mediterranean became the stage for return voyages in which the artists’ creations and the spectators’ gazes were defined by the artistic fusion that is typical of Mediterranean identities.  

The exhibition will present more than one hundred works in diverse techniques (painting, sculpture, goldsmiths’ work, illuminated manuscripts, drawings, embroidery, silk textiles, etc.), many of which are not very well known and some of which have never been on display before.  Works by leading Italian maestros, such as Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Gherardo Starnina, Lupo di Francesco, Barnaba da Modena, Andrea di Petruccio or Geri Lapi, will also be on display, as well as creations by local artists, such as Ferrer and Arnau Bassa, the Serra brothers, Pedro de Córdoba or Miquel Alcañiz. The works come from 31 national and 25 international institutions and the exhibition is curated by Joan Molina Figueras, Head of the Collection of European Painting up to 1500.

Image Credit:

• Detail of the Virgin of Tobed with the Donors Henry II of Castile, his wife, Juana Manuel, and two of their children, Juan and Juana?  Jaume Serra. 1359 - 1362. Tempera on panel. Madrid, Prado National Museum.