My liberal arts education - or at least my student ID - is starting to pay for itself. Madrid has many national museums that are free to the general public or free for students. And for the rest of the museums, the Vassar-Wesleyan program will cover 50-100% of the admission fee! Last Friday I visited the Museo del Romanticismo and the Templo del Debod. On Saturday I headed to the Museo Arqueologico Nacional and the Museo Biblioteca Nacional.
I came across an article about the newly renovated and renamed Museo del Romanticismo in the New York Times this past winter and decided it was worth a visit. This small museum housed in the palace of the Marquis of Matallana captures the essences of 19th century middle class life in Madrid. The Romanticism exhibits include a wide range of art -- from paintings (and painted ceilings) to pianos, coins to carpets. There were different types of pianos in nearly every room!
The museum also offered a small English guide that detailed the purpose of each room. I was intrigued by the gendered spaces -- rooms that were designated as purely masculine or feminine. One of the "men's" rooms displayed a host of artwork that depicted the satire of a romantic suicide. The "women's" rooms were associated with children and the display of "insignificant" trinkets.
After leaving the museum and searching for the Ferrocarril, a gondola ride around Madrid that happened to be closed for the season, we stumbled upon el Templo de Debod, an ancient Egyptian temple that was rebuilt in Spain. The temple itself if proceeded by two large stone gateways. The site was underwhelming; the stone carvings had worn down, and the top floor of the temple was hot and cramped. However, I've heard that the sunsets there are beautiful, so I hope to return some day soon.
On Saturday I visited two museums in the Salamanca neighborhood. El Museo Arqueologico Nacional (National Museum of Archaeology) is small but packed with interesting artifacts! The museum compiles the personal collections of several Spanish monarchs and has lots of ancient swords and jewelry. My two favorite artifacts were a coffin and a sundial (pictured below).
El Museo Arqueologico Nacional shares a building with El Biblioteca Nacional (the National Library). The library has its own museum with an permanent exhibit that places Spain's history of the written word on a chronological timeline beginning with the 16th century. The exhibits were quite long and required a lot of reading in Spanish, but an exhibit about Guttenberg's printing press caught my eye. Overall, I learned about bits and pieces of Spain's history.
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