The Greats of Six Centuries: Masterpieces from the Museo Nacional Thyssen- Bornemi

Located in the heart of Xiao Lujiazui in Shanghai, the modern Museum of Art Pudong (MAP) was built from September 2017 and opened to the public in July 2021. Designed by Ateliers Jean Nouvel, the MAP is managed by the Lujiazui Group and has the principal mission of promo�ng public educa�on, devising cultural ac�vi�es, organising exhibi�ons and encouraging interna�onal exchange with the aim of becoming a cultural point of reference in Shanghai and a major pla�orm for interna�onal cultural exchange.

A survey of six centuries of Western art

The exhibi�on is organised to present a chronological survey, divided into eight sec�ons which extend from the Renaissance to 20^th-century European and American art. The primary focus is on the genres, ar�sts, schools and movements that are par�cularly well represented in the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, such as portraiture and landscape, Dutch and American pain�ng, Impressionism, Expressionism and the early avant-gardes.

1. Faces of the Renaissance. The portrait in northern and southern Europe

Both for the number of pain�ngs and their quality, the genre of portraiture is undoubtedly the most notable within the Thyssen collec�on. This first sec�on features 15^th- and 16^th-century examples from the Flemish, German and Italian schools by ar�sts such as Rogier van der Weyden, Bernhard Strigel, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Raphael, Correggio and Bronzino, among others.

Bronzino (Agnolo di Cosimo di Mariano). Cosimo de Medicis in Armour,

ca. 1545. Oil on panel, 76,5 x 59 cm

2. Baroque pain�ng. Realism and emo�on

The second sec�on presents notable examples of the different genres that became both autonomous and increasingly appreciated from the late 16th century and par�cularly in 17th- century Holland, such as landscape, the s�ll life, interiors and pain�ngs of animals, including works by Ruisdael, Hobbema, Peter de Hooch and Van de Velde III. There are also examples of historical and mythological composi�ons, such as Rubens’s Venus and Cupid and by the French Baroque school.

Peter Paul Rubens. Venus and Cupid, ca. 1606 - 1611.

3. The 18^th century in Europe. Views, landscapes, portraits and other subjects

In 18^th-century Italy the Baroque reached its height with the triumph of the urban view or veduta with Venice as its protagonist and Canaleto as its leading representa�ve. The ar�st’s large-format canvas of The Grand Canal from San Vio, Venice is displayed alongside the work of other Italians such as Longhi and Foschi, leading representa�ves of the French Rococo such as Wateau, Chardin and Vernet and of the English school of portrai�sts such as Reynolds and Zoffany.

Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal). The Grand Canal from San Vio, Venice, ca. 1723 – 1724. Oil on canvas, 140,5 x 204,5 cm

4. 
   The 19^th century in Europe. Realism and French Impressionism

With works by Courbet, Manet and Pissarro, this sec�on shows the evolu�on of pain�ng from the mid-19th century. Landscape became the principal field of ar�s�c experimenta�on as plein air pain�ng and the direct observa�on of mo�fs triumphed, while the experiences of city life and its characters now appear as a pictorial subject. The sec�on concludes with the subjec�ve representa�on of nature achieved by Van Gogh and the decora�ve character of pain�ng exemplified by Bonnard.

Édouard Manet. Horsewoman, Full-Face (L'Amazone), ca. 1882. Oil on canvas, 73 x 52 cm.

5. 19^th-century American pain�ng

Maurice Prendergast. The Race Track (Piazza Siena, Borghese Gardens, Rome), 1898. Watercolor on paper, 35,6 x 46,6 cm.

The importance of landscape in 19^th-century American art is revealed through a group of works that includes examples by the first genera�on of landscape painters. Of European origin or trained there, they adapted the Roman�cism of the sublime to the exuberant nature of the New World with a religious, patrio�c sen�ment. They are followed by the second genera�on, who were closer to the ideals of naturalism, and then, at the end of the century, by painters who reveal the influence of French Impressionism, employing a loose, colourist technique, such as Prendergast and Chase.

6. The 20th century in Europe. Expressionism

Influenced by Van Gogh, Munch and Gauguin, the earliest Expressionist groups - the French Fauves and the Germans of Die Brücke and Der Blaue Reiter - rejected the ar�s�c conven�ons of naturalism and Impressionism, championing a new an�-naturalist concep�on of form and colour in the service of expressivity. Ma�sse, Kirchner and Kandinsky are among the leading names represented in this sec�on, which also includes the work of Russian ar�sts such as Larionov and Chagall.

Emil Nolde. Red flowers, 1906. Oil on canvas, 52,4 x 55,8 cm.

7. The 20^th century in Europe. The Cubist tradi�on

Invented by Picasso and Braque around 1907, Cubism broke with the tradi�onal representa�on of volume and space through an ar�s�c language based on fragmenta�on and simultaneity in order to give rise to a new dimension of the pictorial space. This is evident in a group of works that starts with examples by Braque himself and includes deriva�ons of Cubism by painters such as Léger from France, Feininger from the USA and the Hungarians Bortnyik and Huszár, as well as Italian Futurism.

Fernand Léger. The disc, 1918. Oil on canvas, 65 x 54 cm.

8. Post-war European and American art

Abstract Expressionism dominated the American art scene a�er World War II while in Europe a range of Informalist movements prevailed. Both tendencies priori�sed a new concept of pain�ng based on gesture and colour. This is evident

in the works in this sec�on by Georgia O’Keeffe, Nicolas de Staël, Josef Albers and Charles Sheeler, among others. James Rosenquist’s pain�ng illustrates the emergence of Pop Art in the 1960s, with its exalta�on of everyday objects, consumer goods and adver�sements, while works by Andrew Wyeth and Raphael Soyer demonstrate the survival of realism in the second half of the 20^th century.