“Americans in Spain: Painting and Travel, 1820–1920,” a new exhibition at the Chrysler Museum of Art, explores the influence of Spanish art and culture on American painters who traveled to Spain to study at the Prado Museum and were inspired by the nation’s history, style, and landscape. Co-organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum, the presentation features over 100 paintings, photographs, and prints by prominent American artists—including Mary Cassatt and John SInger Sargent—their Spanish contemporaries, and Spain’s Old Masters.

The extensive impact of Spanish art and culture on American painters in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is the focus of a new exhibition co-organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum and the Chrysler Museum of Art.

Opening on February 12, 2021, in Norfolk, Virginia, and on June 11, 2021, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Americans in Spain: Painting and Travel, 1820–1920 highlights prominent American artists such as Mary Cassatt, William Merritt Chase, Robert Henri and John Singer Sargent, who traveled to Spain for training and to study the old masters at the Prado Museum.

The more than 100 paintings, photographs and prints on view will be presented chronologically and organized to emphasize migration, tourism and travel in nineteenth-century Spain. Additional themes include the romance and the reality of old Spain; Spanish architecture, gardens and landscapes; Spain’s Nasrid history and the country’s Western fantasies; and the collecting and display of Spanish art in the United States. Americans in Spain will also include a 3-D visualization that will recreate the historic galleries at the Prado Museum during the period covered by the exhibition.

“It’s difficult to overstate the importance that Spanish culture had on artists from the United States at the time and we’re delighted to share this important moment and its art with a wider public,” said Brandon Ruud, Abert Family Curator of American Art, Milwaukee Art Museum. “Uniquely, and given the current limitations on travel, the 3-D Visualization of the Prado Museum, Interactive Artist Travelers Project and the app that accompany the exhibition, make it possible for people to visit the Prado Museum and popular sites throughout Spain while exploring the art in the museum or from the comfort of their own homes.”

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