Iberian cornucopia

More than 200 works from Manhattan’s Hispanic Society Museum & Library are on display in Visions of the Hispanic World at the Albuquerque Museum, opening Saturday, Nov. 10. The touring exhibition makes its first U.S. stop in the Duke City after a blockbuster reception at the Prado in Madrid and a brief stay in Mexico City. The Hispanic Society, founded in the early 20th century by philanthropist Archer Milton Huntington, has amassed hundreds of thousands of Hispanic works; the selection on display in Visions spans from the Neolithic to 1920s Spain, including important paintings by Francisco de Goya, Diego Velázquez, and Joaquín Sorolla. On the cover is The Family of the Gypsy Bullfighter, 1903, an oil on canvas by Basque painter Ignacio Zuloaga; courtesy the Albuquerque Museum.

But when a selection of more than 200 of the Hispanic Society’s works was on tour at the Prado Museum in Madrid in the spring of 2017, nearly 500,000 visitors turned out to admire the collection. Former King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofía were among the first attendees. Following a three-month stay at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, the third stop of that royally recognized, New York Timesdubbed “blockbuster” show is Albuquerque. Visions of the Hispanic World: Treasures from the Hispanic Society Museum & Library opens at the Albuquerque Museum on Saturday, Nov. 10.

Works featured upon the opening include ancient, Islamic, medieval, and 19th-century Latin American art, as well as paintings by El Greco, Velázquez, and Francisco de Zurbarán. The exhibition will expand on Dec. 22, when Spanish art from Goya through the 1920s will be added.