Madrid: Museo Lázaro Galdiano and the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza

If you like museums, then you’ll love Madrid, for the Spanish capital is home to countless excellent museums.

I spent a fair bit of my time in the city visiting some of its many museums, among them the superb Museo Lázaro Galdiano and the world-class Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza.

Museo Lázaro Galdiano

Situated in an Italian-style brick villa in Madrid’s ritzy Salamanca district, the Museo Lázaro Galdiano houses an exceptional array of artworks and objects dating from prehistoric times to the 20th century.

The museum is based on the collection of the publisher and businessman José Lázaro Galdiano.

He amassed some 13,000 items during his lifetime, which he left to the Spanish nation upon his death in 1947.

The museum’s 4,820 artifacts are displayed across four floors in Galdiano’s former home and the magnificent mansion is as much a work of art as the objects on display.

The museum is home to a curious mix of artifacts, paintings and royal portraits, including artworks by the likes of Goya, Constable, Hieronymous Bosch and El Greco.

The museum also showcases incredible pieces of jewellery, bric-a-brac, glassware and silver, as well as textures, arms, bronzes and miniatures.

It’s a wonderful, random collection that’s been put together by someone who clearly had an eye for beautiful things.

And while there were many items that weren’t to my taste, I could appreciate the great skill and craftsmanship that had gone into creating them.

The Museo Lázaro Galdiano is a fairly small museum, but well worth a visit if you like gawping at exquisite artifacts and artworks.

Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza

One of a trio of world-class art museums in the Spanish capital, alongside the Prado and the Reina Sofia, the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza should be a must-visit for art lovers.

Exceptionally well curated and home to some phenomenal works, it’s by far my favourite of the three museums.

The museum displays the collection of the wealthy Swiss industrialist Baron Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza, his son Hans Heinrich and daughter-in-law Carmen. The collection was sold to the Spanish nation in 1993.

Housed over three floors in the Villahermosa Palace, there are almost 1,000 paintings spanning the 13th to the 20th centuries on display.

I started my tour on the ground floor with a look around the Carmen Thyssen collection.

It’s a spectacular array of 20th century art, featuring works by the likes of Monet, Van Gogh, Matisse (above), Renoir, Gauguin, Edvard Munch and Roy Lichtenstein (below).

Having looked around the collection, I made my way upstairs, where the next two floors take visitors on a tour of art through the ages – from medieval times to the present day.

The museum’s enormous and there’s lots to see with room after room packed with masterpieces.

Name an artist (aside from one of the mutant ninja turtles) and you’ll probably find them here.

Hans Holbein the Younger, Van Dyck, Jackson Pollack, Kandinsky (above), Rembrandt, Mondrian, Max Ernst, Joan Míro and Vermeer – to name a few – are all present and accounted for.

The second floor is also home to a small exhibition about The Virgin of Humility, a wooden panel painted by the Italian artist Fra Angelico in the 1430s.

The exhibition explains what the museum’s restoration team learned about the painting during its conservation work.

It’s a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the technical studies carried out on the painting, which revealed things such as the techniques Fra Angelico used, how he worked and the changes he made along the way.

During my visit last October, the museum was also hosting two temporary exhibitions:

• a display of paintings by the Australian artist Jody Kerwick (above)
• ‘Picasso: the sacred and the profane’, which compared Picasso’s work to that of other artists, such as Diego Velázquez (below).

The Jody Kerwick exhibition was tiny and not my cup of tea, so I didn’t spend long looking around it.

The Picasso exhibition, meanwhile, was heaving and while it was interesting enough, if I’m honest, I’ve seen better exhibitions.

Temporary exhibitions aside, I loved my visit to the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza. Its permanent collection is one of the finest art collections in the world.

But I think what I like most about the museum is how varied it is – the art spans so many eras and genres, there’s something for everyone.