After two and a half years and with the help of over 1,200 architects, carpenters, electricians, builders and other professionals, the Archaeological Museum of Spain opens its doors on April 1st, 2014. The refurbishment actually began in 2008 and has cost over 60 million Euros. In total 13,000 pieces of archaeology from Prehistory, Greece, Egypt and the Near East, Hispano-Roman, Middle Ages and the Modern Age will be on display to the public. 50 audiovisual screens, maps, illustration and touchscreen points will offer a state-of-the-art experience for visitors.

More Information
Website: National Archaeological Museum

Travelling there
C/ Serrano, 13
28001 Madrid
Spain

Tel: (0034) 91 577 79 12

Public transport
Buses
1, 9, 19, 51, 74: Stop outside museum
5, 14, 27, 45, 150: Stop on Paseo Recoletos
21, 53: Stop at Plaza de Colón
2, 15 20, 28, 52, 146: Stop at Plaza de la Independencia

Metro
Serrano (Line 4) and Retiro (Line 2) underground stations

The good people of Google have created a Google Doodle out of Velázquez’s "Las Meninas" to honour the birth of the great Spanish painter. For those who don’t know, the painting can be found in Madrid’s Prado Museum.

There are quite a few good exhibitions going on in Madrid at this time of year. Here is a breakdown of the temporary exhibitions from the Prado, Reina Sofía and Thyssen Museums and the Juan March Foundation.

Museo de arte Thyssen-Bornemisza

Dürer and Cranach. Art and Humanism in Renaissance Germany

Dates: October 9th, 2007 – January 6th, 2008

Reina Sofía

This museum has a few temporary exhibitions this Autumn, including:

Gustavo Torner – September 11th, 2007 – December 16th, 2007
Paul Rego – September 26th – December 30th, 2007
Andy Goldsworthy – October 3rd, 2007 – January 21st, 2008
Jano – La doble cara de la fotografía. October 10th – December 20th, 2007

Prado Musuem

The 19th century in the Prado including:
Goya and Neo-classicism
History Painting

The end of the century

Dates:  October 31th, 2007 – April 20th, 2008

Fundación Juan March

The Abstraction of Landscape

Dates: October 5th, 2007 – 13th January, 2008

As a forerunner to next week’s ‘Noche en Blanco‘ (White Night), Madrid’s art galleries will be opening their doors tomorrow night until midnight. An initiative of Arte Madrid over 40 galleries will participate. For more details download their pdf document. More details on Noche en Blanco will follow this week. In the meantime you may want to check out Damian Corrigan’s Noche en Blanco page on About.com.

From tomorrow, 12th June 2007, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Musuem will be exhibiting paintings created by Vincent Van Gogh in the last 3 months of his life at Auvers-sur-Oise, France. He painted a total of 72 paintings in 70 days and even painted until the last day of his life! This exhibition brings together 30 works of art – 27 paintings and 3 drawings and will run until the 16th September, 2007.

If you’d like to know more about Vincent Van Gogh’s life, and final few months, go look where everyone else looks: Wikipedia.

If you’re interested in Spanish ‘Modern’ history, you may want to head over to the Círculo de Bellas Artes for its latest exhibition: Post War: Propaganda and Publicity. On show are over 200 posters and other memorabilia which show the close connection of the Franco regime with business. The exhibition runs until the 20th May.

Having spent 152 million Euros on developing the new extension to the Prado Museum, yesterday the new “wing” of the Prado was opened by the Spanish culture minister Carmen Calvo. Designed by the architect Rafael Moneo, it adds an extra 22,000 square metres to the great museum. One of the main focal points will be the cloister of Los Jerónimos church (found next door) which was dismantled, and re-assembled, piece-by-piece.

The extension is open to the public from the 28th April, 2007. The picture above is from an album of Gorka Lejarcegi and found on El Pais‘s website. As yet, you will find nothing on the absolutely crappy and pitiful Prado Museum website – though you may in time! Having spent this much money, it doesn’t even make it their news section.

The clip below is from 20 Minutos:

If you’re off to Madrid for Easter, you may want to take a look at the range of processions and concerts that the city council has put on for its citizens. The following link takes you to the EsMadrid site where you can get more information.

I was just doing some surfing around local Madrid blogs, including Madrid Me Mata, esmadriz! and La Bitacora de Moeh, when I stumbled upon a blog roll on Nuevo Periodismo which linked to bullfighting blogs. For some strange reason I had never thought that people would blog about bullfighting, but there again why wouldn’t they?

On these sites people blog about all things related to bullfighting, from the bullfights to the people who go, to the people involved in the business. Some of the images on these sites are quite stunning – and I don’t just mean the ones from the Plaza but also the ones where the bulls and horse riders are in the campo.

Here is a selection that I found on there.

* A los toros

* Alicia Ureña

* Cornadas para todos
* Desde el tendido 6

* Desde la charrería (on MySpace)
* La Tienta

* Los toros de A. Hervás

* Taurofilia

* Torear

On a related subject, there will be a new film coming out in the Summer on the most famous bullfighter of them all, Manolete. Directed by  Menno Meyes, it will star Adrien Brody as Manolete and the cast includes Penélope Cruz, Santiago Segura and Juan Echanove (household names in Spain).

Madrid, al paso. Fotografías del Diario de Madrid realizadas entre 1926 y 1971 is an exhibition of photographs which appeared in the Madrid newspaper Diario de Madrid (and some which didn’t get to be published) between 1926 and 1971. They give a fascinating insight into the people who lived in the city and the changes that have taken place over the course of this period.

It is divided up into 4 subject areas: the city, business, the streets and the people (the man in the street and personalities). Some of the pictures are really interesting – such as Salvador Dalí eating food, a horse and cart being used in construction near the Palacio Real, trams going through the Plaza Mayor and a waiters’ race complete with wine bottles and glasses! The one with Gary Cooper giving crowds a fascist salute looks a bit suspect, though.

The exhibition includes 170 photos and runs from the 13th March to the 29th April; admission is free. 

Location
Fundación Diario Madrid (C/ Larra 14).
Times
Mon – Sat: 10.30 am to 8.30 pm & Sun10.30 am to 2.30 pm

If you know Madrid at all, you will know that the Plaza Mayor (on Sundays), and the shops around this square, are a favourite haunt of philatelists. Well, from the 7th to the 11th March, 2007 the 39th National Stamp Fair in Madrid will be held in the Plaza Mayor. There will be 21 commercial stalls selling stamps and coins and a special exhibition displaying stamps from the Scout movement. The Real Casa de la Moneda (Spanish Royal Mint) will also be displaying coins and stamps – these are usually held in their (Madrid) museum. It will be possible to purchase a coin to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome.