The Prado : masterpieces / Museo Nacional del Prado ; translation, Philip Sutton.

Includes index.

The Museo del Prado -- In the beginning was the form -- Painting and devotion -- The invention of reality -- The discovery of nature -- The school of the world -- Titian and other prodigies -- Painting as science -- The joy of matter -- Around Rubens and Velázquez -- From Italy to France -- Return to Italy -- Goya and the road to modernity -- Tradition and modernity.

The Museo del Prado is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It features one of the world's finest collections of European art, based on the former Spanish Royal Collection, and is unquestionably the best single collection of Spanish art. Founded as a museum of paintings and sculpture in 1819, it also contains important collections of other types of works. The Prado is one of the most visited sites in the world. The numerous works by Francisco de Goya, the single most extensively represented artist, as well as by Diego Velázquez, El Greco, Titian, Peter Paul Rubens, and Hieronymus Bosch are some of the highlights of the collection. Comprehensively showcasing the museum's permanent collection, this magnificent book is the first of its kind to be published in association with the Prado, covering the collection from ancient sculpture to the nineteenth century. The book is arranged chronologically by the date of the artworks featured, creating a rich dialogue between artists from different schools working in the same period. There are sections looking in depth at specific painters (Velázquez, Titian, El Greco, and Bosch) and at the themes of still life, portraits, and religious paintings. The Prado: Masterpieces can be read as a complete history of Western art, as illustrated by the careful selection of highlights from the museum.s collection.