An art insider’s guide to Madrid’s Golden Triangle

Spanning 8,600 paintings and 700 sculptures, the 200-year-old Prado is home to some of Europe’s greatest canonical art. Its treasures include Las Meninas, Velázquez’ much-analysed masterpiece of monarchs and mirrors, family life and courtly drama, along with Rubens’ sumptuous vision of mythology, overflowing with fleshy nymphs. Most famous of all, perhaps, are Goya’s so-called ‘Black Paintings’ – demonic murals exploring the chaos of the human condition, which have left many a visitor wobbly at the knees. Alongside these three big guns, you’ll find some of the most instantly recognisable paintings on the planet, including Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights.

In the know In 2021, a curatorial rethink saw the Prado reach beyond the usual rollcall, to add 13 women painters to its collections. Look out for some exquisite pieces by 17th-century miniaturist and noblewoman Marcela de Valencia.

Welcome to the world-beating collection of the Thyssen-Bornemisza family. The museum offers a masterpiece-lined walk-through of European art history, from 13th-century Italian masters, hovering on the edge of the Renaissance, to playful pop-art pieces. Every master, creative front-runner and beguiling outlier is here. From Lucas Cranach’s eerie nymphs to Hans Holbein’s luxuriant Tudors, Rembrandt’s soul-searching self-portraiture to Hopper’s cinematic vision, this place has it all and more. The collection is housed in the former Villahermosa Palace, handsomely reconfigured by architect Rafael Moneo, with marble floors, plenty of stucco, and galleries bathed in natural light. 

In the know Caravaggio’s Saint Catherine of Alexandria lingers in the mind, thanks to its sitter’s strangely contemporary charisma (in real life, she was a celebrated courtesan, who also posed for Caravaggio’s grisly masterpiece, Judith Beheading Holofernes).