iMuseo Reina SofíaAtocha
Manolo Millares
A centenary retrospective built around the visceral mixed-media works of Spanish Informalist painter Manolo Millares (1926-1972), exploring repression and human suffering through torn hessian and abstraction.
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A square of hessian, 150 cm a side, has been crumpled and stitched into something like a body wrapped in its burial cloth, stretched across a red horizon the museum likens to dried blood. Manolo Millares made Personaje caído I (Fallen Figure I) in 1970, two years before he died at 46.
It is the only work in the room. Pieza Única, on the first floor of the Sabatini Building, shows one piece from the collection at a time, and this one marks the centenary of his birth in Las Palmas in 1926. The museum ties the torn, sewn sacking to the Guanche mummies he saw as a boy and to life under Franco. You get one painting and the time to look at it. "I believe my art slaps death to justify life," Millares wrote.
It is a short stop to add to a collection visit. Tickets are €12, and entry is free Monday to Saturday 19:00 to 21:00 and Sunday 12:30 to 14:30.
Look for
Personaje caído I (Fallen Figure I), 1970
Look for the stitched, bunched hessian forming a wrapped figure with arms spread like a crucifixion, taut as a shroud over a dried-blood red horizon.
Good for
- An Hour Or Less
- Evening Visits
- Locals Who've Seen It All
Skip if
You want a centenary retrospective: this is one painting in a single room.
Also at Museo Reina Sofía
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Image credits
7
- Manolo MillaresCourtesy of Museo Reina Sofía
- We Are Nature: An Immersive Audiovisual ExperienceCourtesy of CaixaForum Madrid
- Museo Reina SofíaMuseoreinasofia, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- CaixaForum MadridDraceane / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Museo del PradoEmilio J. Rodríguez Posada (Emijrp), via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
- Museo Thyssen-BornemiszaLuis García (Zaqarbal), CC BY-SA 3.0
- Museo NavalFernando, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0