Rubens (1577-1640) is, surely, one of those artists who needs no introduction. One of those who is known even to those least accustomed to strolling through museums and exhibitions. However, Rubens also does not fit the stereotype of a painter ignored in his time and exalted with the passage of decades, but rather in his era he became one of the most coveted and desired creators by collectors and patrons throughout Europe. In fact, the influence of this artist was such that he even managed to revive 17th-century Flemish painting, after some years in which Dutch art seemed to have fallen into decadence.
The expressiveness and dynamism of his characters, the sensuality of the portrayed bodies —which, far from the idealized canon inherited from Antiquity, portrays real, curvy bodies—, as well as his passion and creative drive served as a stimulant and inspiration for contemporary Flemish artists. Thus, alongside Rubens, artists such as Van Dyck, Jordaens, or Brueghel flourished and managed to stand out individually, although on occasion they also worked collectively. These artists now invade the walls of CaixaForum and demonstrate that, beyond the trends of contemporary museography (full of interactive experiences, virtual or augmented realities), there are works that speak for themselves and that still today manage to leave visitors marvelled by their beauty and pictorial qualities. These Flemish Baroque paintings do not need complements or additions because they are self-sufficient and shine on their own.
The exhibition, which can be enjoyed until September 21, is the sixth fruit sown by the relationship between the La Caixa Foundation and the Museo Nacional del Prado, and has allowed access to great treasures kept in the Madrid museum without the need to leave the Catalan capital, to get to know figures such as Goya or Velázquez, and now also Rubens and his contemporaries with more than 62 works. To do this, CaixaForum first takes us into the creative studio of the Baroque genius in his house-workshop in Antwerp which, despite being a dispensable room in the exhibition as a whole, serves to understand the genius's personality.
Because Rubens' creative force and artistic drive do not arise randomly, but are the result of an innate passion and vitality. As highlighted by the director of the Prado Museum, Miguel Falomir, Rubens represents the opposite of the stereotype of the unhappy painter misunderstood by society —perfectly embodied by Van Gogh— and shows himself as a vital and passionate artist. An artist who cultivated everything from oil paintings to tapestries, architectural works, and even book covers. Passionate about painting, studying and copying works by ancient and contemporary creators, but also about literature and Antiquity, Ovid's Metamorphoses being one of his many sources of inspiration.
Thus, myths and episodes starring divinities are one of the great themes within Rubens' work and, consequently, of the exhibition at CaixaForum. Episodes that, however, increasingly escape classical idealization and approach humanization. The dynamism and expressiveness that Rubens paints make divinities increasingly closer to humans and even adopt their fleshy and twisted bodies. This characteristic causes humans who observe the paintings to feel represented in these divine figures and identify with their defects and vices. Likewise, the punishments that these divinities receive for their vices can also be applied, therefore, to humans. And it is that the vices and sins of divinities, in reality, are a reflection of the vices of the people who inhabit the real world and, in the case of Rubens and his contemporaries, 17th-century Flanders.
This humanization of divine figures can be observed, for example, in the way Rubens painted nudes, which increasingly move away from the ideal bodies of Antiquity and become voluptuous and curvy figures. Although naked or semi-naked men also appear, it is female bodies that are most often portrayed and that, moreover, arouse greater interest among collectors.
The female nude in art—which responds to that sexualized gaze that, since always, the female body has received—is, in fact, a common theme since the beginnings of humanity. Already in Prehistory, female bodies were associated with fertility through the figures of the Venuses (although it is not ruled out that these amulets were, in reality, sexual objects). During the Greek and Roman eras, the nudity of female torsos was also associated with divinities that appeared sculpted in a harmonious and idealized way.
Therefore, since Antiquity, and even since Prehistory, it seemed that the only pretext in which a nude could appear, to comply with established morality, was in mythological or religious episodes. In the case of Christian paintings, for example, nudity was associated with lust embodied in the figure of naked Eve. Still in Rubens' time, mythology was the only morally permitted context in which nudes could appear, serving almost as a cover to portray female sensuality. Female nudes—hidden under pretexts or mythological episodes—were, in fact, one of the favorite themes of collectors and patrons who, evidently, were men.
However, these nudes, already since the Renaissance, become increasingly humanized: female figures cease to be divinities that inhabit worlds beyond human reach and Goddesses look more like real women who inhabit everyday scenes, as in the case of Titian's Venus of Urbino, which is set in a court and presents an almost provocative and very humanized position and gaze. The artist featured in this exhibition at CaixaForum, Rubens, follows this humanizing trend of nudes, presenting voluptuous and curvy women.
These increasingly humanized and less divine female bodies could be the reason that led to the later decision to incorporate veils to cover the provocative figures of the three divinities represented in the painting The Judgment of Paris. An oil painting that in Barcelona recovers, for the first time, its original form, after a nine-month restoration that has restored its original lighting and brilliance and has managed to eliminate these veils that were added later as a response to the morality of the time.
The exhibition at CaixaForum therefore represents the first opportunity to observe this oil painting, which usually occupies one of the central corridors of the Prado Museum, after its careful restoration. With as much caution as in its restoration, this essential work of art history has been moved from Madrid to the Catalan capital. It has done so in a trailer with temperature and humidity control, accompanied by the restoration team and the Prado's 'courier', that is, the technical professional who guards the works when they are lent to other institutions, in this case to CaixaForum.
After its arrival at the room hosting the exhibition Rubens and the artists of the Flemish Baroque, a team of technicians, with documentation, references and flashlight in hand, is in charge of determining that the work has not suffered any damage. A delicate and detailed job that can only be carried out by a specialized team. "Art is not perfect and there are things like the tension of the canvas or certain deformations that only the human eye can appreciate," emphasizes Alicia Peral, the person responsible for guarding this work from the Prado. Once examined, six operators are in charge of placing this work on the wall where it will hang until September 21, before being returned to its permanent location in the Madrid museum.
The painting, which stands as one of the great attractions of the exhibition —making it only for appreciating this work the exhibition already stands as a mandatory visit—, is not only fascinating for its current history, with the careful transfer from one institution to another, but also for the history and symbolism it contains within itself. The oil represents the moment when Paris must choose the most beautiful among the goddesses Juno, Minerva and Venus, each of whom offers him a reward according to the attributes they represent as divinities: power, wisdom or love, respectively.
Indeed, Paris chooses to follow his passion and opt for Venus and love, staying with Helen. Thus, renouncing victory in all battles or the possibility of becoming emperor of Asia, a reward offered to him by the other two deities, and also causing the famous Trojan War. This painting also serves as an excuse to perform an interesting exercise and challenge: to find the hidden symbolisms in the paintings, which are hidden behind common figures or allegories.
A game that sometimes seems easy, as there are symbols that are repeated and become commonplaces among artists: the dog or the parrot as a symbol of marital fidelity or an angel with wings as a symbol of Cupid and love, but which is sometimes more elaborate. The three naked deities in the painting of The Judgment of Paris, whose bodies are painted almost identically, can in fact be differentiated by the symbols and objects with which they appear: Venus accompanied by this winged youth, Minerva with armor and the owl embodying wisdom, and Juno with a peacock as a symbol of fidelity. A symbolic game and challenge that, in fact, CaixaForum itself proposes to us at the end of the exhibition: with a room called "Between the workshop and the gallery", in which the visitor becomes a creator. A room where the symbols and elements of the painting have been decontextualized and loose and it is up to the visitors to place them in their corresponding paintings (or perhaps not and precisely this is the grace of it all: to see that different symbols can serve in different works of art).
However, symbols are not only found in mythological scenes, but Rubens and his contemporaries also reformed religious paintings —which experienced a boost after the destruction of art due to wars and the Counter-Reformation—, images of monarchs and battles, and even everyday scenes and still lifes. A revolution and a tendency towards dynamism, humanization, and expressiveness that was not only inspired by Rubens, but also appears in Van Dyck and Jordaens. Artists who are also protagonists of the CaixaForum exhibition, in a show that allows comparing how two artists worked a same motif or theme similarly or differently, placing paintings by these creators side by side.
These artists, in fact, often worked collaboratively on large and detailed paintings. Collective works that simply leave the visitor speechless, who could spend hours to fully appreciate the infinity of details, as in the case of the series Sight and Smell, where the theme is metapainting, that is, artistic creations and collecting become the main subject of the oil painting itself. The exhibition thus covers a wide variety of themes, by artists who knew how to use their passion and interests and transform them into artistic drive, revolutionizing not only a country and an era, but practically the entire history of Western painting.