The Villanueva Pavilion, located in the Royal Botanical Gardenwelcome between September 8 to and 23 October “Art and spirituality. Imagining the extraordinary”, a sample with almost fifty pieces distributed in four sections, which propose a meeting between ancient art and that of the 20th and 21st centuries. The exhibition reflects the richness and variety of the BBVA Collection in various media and techniques: painting, sculpture, photography and video art.
Specifically, works by some 43 authors like Luís Vélez, Joaquín Sorolla, David Teniers II, Pablo Palazuelo, Nacho Criado, Ouka Leele, Juan de Soreda or Jaime Plensa. The majority of the works belong to the BBVA Collection, in addition to some on loan from other collections. The exhibition aims to highlight the importance that spirituality, understood as a universal phenomenon, has had in the artistic creation over time.
The opening ceremony was attended by Stephen Manriquedirector of the Royal Botanical Garden, Juan Carlos Hidalgo, Director of the Territorial Center of BBVADesirée Granda, Global Director of Real Estate and Services at BBVA and the exhibition curator, Alfonso of the Tower.
“This exhibition organized by BBVA with funds from our collection arises from our commitment to culture, from the conviction that art and culture are key elements to positively transform people’s lives”, he stated. Desiree Granda, Global Real Estate Director and BBVA Services. During the presentation, Granda added that one of the main objectives is to make available to everyone and share with the public an important selection of the 9,000 works that form part of BBVA’s artistic heritage.
The visitor can see how the artists have reflected and transmitted to their works their own spirituality, each using various resources such as religion, philosophy, light, emptiness, silence, metaphor or symbol. His works evoke the experience of the supernatural, which is an invitation to the viewer to “imagine the extraordinary”.
In addition, the BBVA Collection offers the public guided tours of the exhibition, upon registration, as well as access to an audio guide in Spanish and English that will accompany you on your tour of the different rooms. In the Web page of the BBVA Collection, you can get more information about the pieces on display, as well as know the biographies of the artists and access a selection of pieces commented by the curator.
BBVA’s cultural commitment
At BBVA, culture and art are key elements in the generation and dissemination of knowledge and constitute an essential tool for economic and social transformation. Likewise, the entity has contributed to preserving and consolidate the Spanish cultural heritage through the BBVA Collection, made up of some 9,000 pieces of different genres and styles. In addition, the installation of artistic works in BBVA’s most emblematic buildings throughout Spain contributes to promoting the integration of art in the work environment.
To bring this heritage closer to a wider public, the BBVA Collection website offers virtual content so that any user can enjoy more than a thousand pieces and deepen their knowledge. It is even possible to explore the most current creations by their authors or visit exhibitions in virtual reality, such as the 20th century art in the BBVA Collection either Concordances, a collaboration with the BBVA Collection in Mexico. This digital window reveals a part of the work that the entity carries out to contribute to the promotion and dissemination of art and culture.
A journey in four chapters
This exhibition seeks to highlight the importance of spirituality in artistic creation over time, through four sections that range from the origin to the transience of life. In the words of the curator, “he proposes images presented as apparitions, clear and ardent presences that, although they go through different times in the history of art, seem to have arisen in a new moment of time, as if we were granted privileged assistance at the moment of an event” .
The journey through this set of extraordinary images begins with pieces such as the metaphysical box by Jorge Oteizawhich exemplifies the birth of the image of the invisible. The second section hosts creations related to images of the sky and their symbolic equivalents −paradises, gardens or Edens−, and also those that illustrate the opposite, death and desolation –deserts and graveyards−. Themes represented with works by David Teniers, Ouka Leele, Yves Tanguy or César Manrique.
Extraordinary manifestations of the supernatural, such as ecstasy, miracles or apparitions, are reflected in the third section that features the works of Bill Viola or Luis Velez as main representatives. In addition, the visitor will be able to contemplate some pieces that relate a more common and closer connection with the divinelike the small private altar of John of Soreda or the sculpture of Sea Solis.
The last part of this tour revolves around the idea of the transience of life, whose representation par excellence is the vanitas. The viewer will have at their disposal several exceptional pieces, such as an anonymous painting of Saint Jerome, or two vanitas of Joaquin Sorolla Y Marina Abramovic.
In addition, the mysticism of the experience is reinforced by a musical selection made by Joan Gómez Alemany, entitled ‘Music and spirituality. hear the extraordinary‘. An eclectic compilation that transports us to various ways of understanding spirituality around the world and which the public can access through a QR code.
The performance will be screened in one of the exhibition halls Ripple. Expansive wave by the artist Mar Solís, who was represented for the first time during the opening of the same exhibition in Bilbao.
BBVA takes the exhibition “Art and spirituality” to the Royal Botanical Garden