Colonial Memory in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collections

The temporary exhibition hall (ground floor) at the Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum will host an exhibition from 25 June to 20 October that sets out to decipher the elements of colonial power within the iconography of certain works in the Thyssen-Bornemisza collections. It is a journey through the reality that lies at the origins of modern western society while its legacy continues to affect human and geopolitical relations around the world. 

This exhibition consists of a selection of paintings that will reveal “invisibilised” stories of racial domination, marronage and the civil rights struggle, as well as the introduction of the modern mercantile system based on European military control, the use of enslaved African workers and the appropriation of firstly Latin American and later Asian and African land and raw materials.

Visitors will be introduced to fictitious representations of new Arcadias and will witness the western projection of its unsatisfied desires in the form of the “Orient” and the construction of the “other” as barbarian or primitive. 

The exhibition boasts a curatorial team comprising Juan Ángel López-Manzanares (curator at the museum and project manager), Alba Campo Rosillo (art historian), Andrea Pacheco González (independent curator and artistic director of the "FelipaManuela" space), and Yeison F. García López (director of the “Espacio Afro” cultural centre).

Image Credits:

• Frans Hals, Family Group in a Landscape, ca.1645-1648 Oil on Canvas. 202 x 285 cm © Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, Madrid
• Willem van de Velde ii. The Dutch Fleet in the Goeree Roads, ca. 1672-1673 Oil on Canvas. 69.5 x 97.8 cm. © Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, Madrid
• Charles Ferdinand Wimar. The Lost Trail, ca. 1856 Oil on Canvas. 49.5 x 77.5 cm. © Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, Madrid
• Jan Jansz. van de (attributed) Velde iii. Still Life with Chinese Dish. Rummer, Knife, Bread and Fruit, ca. 1650-1660 Oil on Canvas. 44.7 x 38.8 cm. © Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, Madrid