JJ Merelo

A view of the stairs inside Hintze Hall. The handrail is highly decorated, with carvings of animals. At the top of the stairs, a giant sequoia slice is visible.

A view of the ornate arches in Hintze Hall, carved with floral patterns. In the background, stairs are visible.

A view of the ornate arches in Hintze Hall, carved with floral patterns. In the background, there are tall, arched windows, and a statute of Charles Darwin.

Come for the dinosaurs, stay for the architecture! 🤩

We couldn’t resist sharing some more photos taken on a recent stroll around the Museum!

Have you ever noticed these details? ✨

Right, the same Zuccaro that collaborated with Vasari painting the cupola of Santa Maria dei Fiori in Firenze is the author of this Christ with the Cross and the one at the symmetric street at the other side, the Flagellation. Only the best money can buy for the pantheon of the emperors of Spain

But Juan de Herrera, the awesome polymath that also designed the whole building and much of its contents, is the only Spaniard participating in this altarpiece (and he was only the designer). The rest are Italians, up to and including Zuccaro, the Vasari collaborator and writer

Corinthian over Ionic over Doric is just the way it should be; separation between floors totally devoid decoration, just the bare marble in different colors. A few years before in Spain, these altarpieces were more sculpted and less “built”. This was designed by Juan de Herrera himself.

The altarpiece of El Escorial was a breakpoint in Spanish art, and created a template for everything that came after, giving the style its name. And it’s architecturally Renaissance, with harmonic proportions in the different “bodies” or stages (IDK if that’s the word) and “lanes” (again, IDK)

Donald has killed a geriatric mass murdering fundamentalist & replaced him with a younger and more extreme version, all while saving the Russian war machine by spiking the oil price.

Nice not to be the only master strategist.

Illumined Pleasures (1929) displays Old Master smoothness while smuggling in taboo comedy. Forms read like cutouts pinned to dream-space—more diagram than atmosphere. Dalí made Freud into visual grammar, not just a theme.

To be honest, I’ve never been there. It’s always a new exhibit at the Prado or a floor I neglected at the Thyssen… Or other museums like the Lazaro Galdeano or Colecciones Reales… I guess I’ll have to go.

A Russian anti-jamming navigation chip Ukraine's air defenses first pulled from downed drones in December was found in the Iranian drone that struck the UK's RAF Akrotiri air base in Cyprus on 1 March, The Times says.

🔗 euromaidanpress.com/2026/03/08/i...

Monet makes the world go around... We take a look at exhibitions in France and elsewhere to mark the centenary this year of Claude Monet's death: art-exhibitions.blogspot.com/2026/02/mone.... Pictured: The Rocks at Belle-Ile, the Wild Coast, 1886, @museeorsay.bsky.social, Paris.

The little blue blob in the hand is actually a pigeon, another avatar of the Mediterranean Mother Goddess, and a very common image, as ex-voto, in many santuaries. Maybe even preserved as the Holy Spirit in Christian symbology. And associated to the Virgin del Rocío, “the white dove”. Nacheben!

This might explain the similarities with other female deities: the “potnia Theron” of Micene and Crete, or even Isis and Astarté. The “eagle” throne, and the paws as legs are iconographically usual in that context. But the richness of this funerary monument made in granite are amazing.

It was found in a tomb in a Iberian necropolis, one just like this reconstruction; it was dated in the 5-6th century AD, centuries before the Romans started to invade the country, but an age where trade with Carthaginians and Greece, as well as probably Etruscans and Celts, was abundant.

Although this is not an original, or a copy, but a reconstruction of the Baza Dame, it’s a good prop to talk a bit about this archaeological find, one of the most important of the Iberian culture (together with the “Elche lady”, which is simply a bust).
This is actually a funerary urn.

"we have strongly told the Russians to stop doing what Donald says doesn't matter"

This will work. Just as Obama's 'concern' worked.

Hey, service members and family of service members! Good news! Russia assisting in targeting you/your loved ones "does not really matter"!

Bet you're relieved to hear that.

Instead of WW3, why don't we call it the Global Special Military Operations?

And, of course, the symbolism of this beautiful rendition of the Annunciation: this church (which is now co-cathedral) was built over the “aljama” mosque, which was also built over a Visigothic cathedral, since Baza was episcopal see from the 4th century. Symbolic victory over Islam again.

Which is a pity, because two of the great Spanish Renaissance architects, Siloé and Covarrubias, were at work in this church. Check the fine stonework in the plaque over the door, and in the angels, niches, even grutteschi , the triomphal arc shape that is so characteristic of early Baroque…

This picture of another portal to the right of the previous one shows how the stone is flaking away, eating at the features and even affecting the structure. “Red” means that it needs immediate intervention. Something that is probably not happening any time soon.

Couple of reasons I wanted to visit Baza, a town 1 hour and change away from Granada. First, I read about this specific portal entering the “red” or endangered list of Hispania Nostra, since it’s literally melting away, affected by stone decay due possibly to sulphuric emissions

6 years ago almost to the day, in fact. The details are more minimalistic than neoclassical: no fillets, for instance, and no decoration on the frieze. The flat roof reminds more of a Egyptian temple than a Greek one, in fact, but I guess concrete helps you solve your surfaces any way you want.

Using Greek temples for civic institutions in democratic countries comes probably for the fact that “democratic” is a Greek word, although obviously not democratic by any current definition.
I don’t know if the square and stair case is usually this empty, but this was right before the lockdown.

The word that best describes the Sheffield City Hall is “Grandiose”. In the 1920s it was Steeltown UK and had enough money to build this place, designed by the architect Vincent Harris, very obviously a classicists that didn’t care much about a human scale to transmit power and, I guess, fairness

Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Collection, given by their family

Francis Picabia, The Spring, Saint Cloud, spring or summer 1912
https://botfrens.com/collections/14377/contents/1136056

Michelangelo's study for the Libyan Sibyl, and finished figure on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Love how much attention he devoted to her toes! Today is his day.

"Still life Reslicitando" by Remedios Varo features a surreal composition where fruits and dishes appear to orbit a centrally placed lit candle, creating a scene that defies gravity. The rich textures and mystical atmosphere are characteristic of Varo's unique blend of magic realism and imaginative storytelling in art.

Still life Reslicitando
https://botfrens.com/collections/69/contents/19562

Image of Palais de Papes in Avignon

I could get on board with the current East Wing plans being replaced with a new antipapal palace in Avignon's Palais de Papes style

Discover new perspectives on one of Spain’s most intriguing artists and the vibrant artistic networks of his time.

🔗 Learn more: meadowsmuseumdallas.org/cal/luis-mar...

#ArtHistory #RaimundoDeMadrazo #MeadowsMuseum #LuisMartinLectureSeries #ArtLectures #SpanishArt #MuseumEvents

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Ceres is for instance in the Codex Escurialensis, which inspired many works all over Spain. But Baroque (this fountain is from the 16th century) was an age where artisans were becoming liberal artists, but guilds still regulated what was done and its price, so this might be it. Not great, but art.