March 14th, 2024 (4:30-6:00pm Boston | 21:30 Madrid) | In Person & via Zoom
RSVP: https://bit.ly/RSVPObservatorio or info-observatory@fas.harvard.edu
In 1934, just before the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, a significant artistic ensemble of mural paintings was torn from the walls of the Monastery of Arlanza in Burgos, Spain. Fragments of this exceptional medieval bestiary were distributed among various Spanish and North American collections, with the most significant pieces now housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Catalonia's Museo Nacional de Arte, and the Harvard Art Museums. In this conference, conservator Cristina Morilla and art historian Felipe Pereda (both from Harvard University) will address the (self)looting of this treasure of Castilian medieval painting and reconstruct its fascinating journey from Burgos to the United States. The content of their presentation is part of an ongoing research project in collaboration with Professor Jeffrey F. Hamburger (Harvard University), an expert in medieval religious art.
Cristina Morilla works as a painting restorer at the Harvard Art Museums, and is a specialist in works spanning medieval Europe to the beginning of the Modern Age. Her most recent projects, which include the technical analysis and the altarpiece restoration of the Natividad de Arnau Bassa (ca. 1340), "San Juan y Santa Bárbara" by Lluís Borrassà (ca.1421), and the portrait of King Philip III of Spain by Pantoja de la Cruz (ca. 1603), are distinguished examples of Spanish art's recovery in Harvard University's museums.
Felipe Pereda is the Fernando Zóbel de Ayala Professor of Spanish Art at Harvard University. A graduate from Universidad Complutense in Madrid, he received his PhD from the Universidad Autónoma of Madrid (1995), where he taught until 2011. He has also worked as a professor at the Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas of the Universidad Autónoma of México and at Johns Hopkins University. His research focuses on Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque Spanish art, art theory, image theory, and the history of architecture. Several highlights of his works include La arquitectura elocuente (1999), El atlas del Rey Planeta (2003), Las imágenes de la discordia: Política y poética de la imagen sagrada en la España del cuatrocientos (2007) and Torrigiano. The Man who Broke Michelangelo's Nose (2024).
Language: Spanish