Organized by the Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris-Musées and the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, this exhibition  shows how, in the ominous and oppressive context of France's defeat during World War II and Nazi occupation, the artists of the day rebelled against official slogans by coming up with novel aesthetic solutions that changed the future of art.

Ten sequences comprising more than 500 works by some 100 artists, including Georges Braque, Jean Dubuffet, Marcel Duchamp, Alberto Giacometti, Vasily Kandinsky, Pablo Picasso and Joseph Steib, testify to how these creators resisted and reacted to adversity, “making war on war” with the only forms and materials available in those times of penury, even in environments of incredible hostility toward any expression of individual freedom. This unique exhibition reveals what until this time had remained in the shadows of History.

This show presents the entire oeuvre of the Spanish painter Juan Fernández, known as “El Labrador”, who worked in the first half of the 17th century and was a key name in the early development of the still life in Spain. El Labrador’s fame as a painter of such works, which were greatly in demand from collectors, extended beyond Spain and paintings by his hand were to be found in the English royal collection.

The five works by the artist in the Prado’s collection – a floral still life acquired from a private collector in 1946, which may have been in the royal collections in the seventeenth century, plus four paintings that entered the Museum with the Naseiro collection in 2006 – are on view alongside the rest of the artist’s known oeuvre. These additional works are primarily loaned from private international collections and will assist in promoting greater knowledge of the remarkable work of this exquisite, enigmatic painter.

W. A. Mozart: Overture to Don Giovanni
C. Bernaola (1929-2002): La Celestina, suite (Estreno absoluto)
Strauss: Don Quixote, Op. 35

Orquesta de la Comunidad de Madrid
Juanjo Mena, conductor
Asier Polo, cello