Displaying items by tag: the garden of earthly delights

On one side is the Prado, a renowned repository of art and a showcase of Spanish culture that draws huge numbers of tourists. On the other is a brash newcomer, emerging onto the scene in layers of gray granite from a hillside near the baroque royal palace of Spanish kings.

In advance of its opening, the upstart, the Museum of Royal Collections, is insisting that the Prado surrender four paintings, including its top two attractions — “The Garden of Earthly Delights” by Hieronymus Bosch and a sumptuous 15th-century depiction of the descent of Christ from the cross by Rogier van der Weyden.

Spain’s Museo del Prado may lose some of its most famous works to a new museum for the Spanish Royal Collection, set to open in 2016. According to a report by Spanish paper, El Confidencial, the president of the country’s national heritage authority, José Rodríguez-Spiteri Palazuelo, has requested that the museum return four paintings to the Royal Collection. The paper claims that Palazuelo sent the request to Museo del Prado director Miguel Zugazza in a letter on July 24th.

The four works requested to be returned are: Hieronymus Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights (1500-1505) and The Seven Deadly Sins (1500-1525), Tintoretto’s Washing of the Feet (1548), and Roger van der Weyden’s The Descent from the Cross (c. 1435).