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Culture

marks the beginning of Picasso’s blue period,
an elaborate staging of numerous persons in
the heavens over the corpse and mourners
of Casagemas, draws on The Adoration of the
Name of Jesus, a high baroque assemblage of a
great multitude both on earth in heaven.

And so on. The correspondences continue on
into cubism, with two full galleries devoted to
the works from 1910 onward, counterbalanced
by a selection from the Museo del Greco in
Toledo and the grandiose Resurrection of
Christ from the Prado.

The importance of such exhibits – often
criticized for their immense expense for
a regrettably short life span – cannot be
exaggerated. This one, typically, brings together
masterpieces from museums all over the world
as well as from private collections. Such a
gathering of the greats allows everyone, from
the curious art-illiterate beginner to the long- Picasso’s Madame Canals (Benedetta Bianco) is a three-quarter portrait
time connoisseur, to view a briefly convened looking right with the full bust represented. El Greco’s Lady in a Fur Wrap
assembly of superlative art in a way otherwise is a similar portrait but with the subject looking left. Yet, once again, it is
impossible, a veritable course in art history but the intense gaze of each, and in this case also the set of the mouth, that
with no need of the picture books – precisely makes them counterparts.
one of the main objectives of the exercise.

In this case, the setting, the Kunstmuseum’s
Neubau (new building), across the street from
the original museum but seamlessly connected
to it under ground, offers each painting a vast
ocean of otherwise empty wall space that allows
it to be viewed by itself with no neighboring
images tempting one to glance aside.

Hats off to the curator, Carmen Giménez,
assisted by Gabriel Dette, Josef Helfenstein
and Ana Mingot.
A two-hundred-page catalog, lovingly edited
by Giménez and Helfenstein, is available in
both English and German.

And in passing, one might keep in mind
the museum’s substantial and spectacular
permanent collection (the world’s oldest
public art collection), major parts of which
change on a rotating basis, and for which it is
worth making a day of the visit. For a break
from the tour, the museum’s café offers a
full menu of lunches, hot and cold, and light
offerings throughout the day.

w w w. d i va i n t e r n at i o n a l . c h