Thyssen & Galdiano Museums

Wednesday, March 04, 2009 Madrid Spain
This morning about 10 AM found us walking the streets of Madrid to find the Carmen Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum. This museum is famous for housing basically minor works by major artists and major works by minor artists. But as a new art-lover I did appreciate how such a wonderful collection complements the work we have already seen in the Prado.
We saw painting by: Picasso, Dali, Goya, John Singer Sargent, Gainsborough, Georgia O’Keeffee, Bellini, Toulouse-Lautrec, and in one room placed together was a Monet, a Van Gogh and a Renoir…. Hard to chose which I liked the best. A lot of work by Paul Gaugin and even a few by Jackson Pollock. But my favorite was finding David Teniers II who had 4 paintings in this museum. Remember his is the painting I was so taken with at the Prado.
Leaving the Thyssen Museum we found the local Metro Stop and headed to a new area of Madrid to find a little known museum that Martha’s husband, Jim, had found on the internet and said he knew that we would both really enjoy the art. Took us a bit of wandering around after we had left the metro to find the Fundacion Lazaro Galdiano Museum. Going up the wrong street we were surprised to find The American Embassy …. Talk about a lot of security surrounding a place… WOW it looked like they were guarding Fort Knox. Anyway we finally found our way and so enjoyed this small museum which, was actually a private home turned into a museum to house the private collections of the owner. The furniture along with the artwork and decorative ceilings etc were worth the price of admission. We lucked out and got senior rates again… a good bargain for 2 euros each.
Another walk to find our Metro again. This time we ended up transferring to 3 different trains within the system before we got back to our home station. We got lots of exercise today with all the stairways up and down inside the metro and walking 2 museum …. On the way home we made a stop at our favorite grocery store and purchased items for our supper tonight. Oh yes, before we caught the metro to come home we saw a large
Group of young people doing a protest… the police were marching in front of them, along side of them and behind the group. Martha kept snapping pictures but I just wanted to get down in the metro and away from the protest. She is much braver than I am….and the Metro coming home was so packed with people… no chance of getting a seat… we just stood with people pressed in all around us holding our pack packs up against our purses to keep everything safe. But here we are typing on our computers safe and sound tucked into our Hostel for the evening and wish I could say I’m not tired but am glad that tomorrow will be a rest day before we head off for Barcelona on Friday.