Posing at the Prado, Madrid

Posing at the Prado, Madrid

Ooh – just was looking through my pictures from last June looking for something else and came across this.  It’s me next to a bronze statue of a painter by I forget what artist outside the Museo del Prado in Madrid.

I turned forty last February and sometime around my birthday I got a phone call.  It was my dad.  “How’d you like to go to Spain?” he asked.

Would I ever.  So last June we packed our bags and headed to Madrid.  I lost no time dragging him to the Prado, where by pure good fortune they had an incredible exhibit of paintings by Joachin Sorollo –  a contemporary of Sargent and an amazing painter!  The collection of Velazquez paintings was truly to die for, too.  My favorite was Los Borrachos (The Drunks) – what a study in character!

Los Borrachos, Diego Velazquez, 1629

Los Borrachos, Diego Velazquez, 1629

We also spent a day in Toledo and saw Gaudi’s fabulous Sagrada Familia cathedral and the Picasso Museum in Barcelona.

I didn’t have much time to paint, but it didn’t matter – it was a feast for the eyes!

(The food was great, too!)