‘Dressing Queen Mariana of Austria’, Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena

FINAL WEEKEND, EXHIBIT ENDS: March 24, 2025

Norton Simon Museum
411 West Colorado Boulevard
Pasadena, California

Exhibited for the first time on the West Coast, Velázquez’s monumental image will be installed alongside an international group of artists whose works were collected by the Habsburg court. Paintings by Nicolas Poussin, Guido Reni and Peter Paul Rubens, all highlights from the Norton Simon Museum’s collections, evoke Mariana’s everyday access to remarkable works of art, and invite comparisons between Velázquez and the artists he knew and admired. Mariana: Portrait of a Queen by Velázquez will be exhibited alongside paintings by Jusepe de Ribera, Bartolomé-Esteban Murillo, and Francisco de Zurbarán, offering a unique opportunity to view this essential quartet of 17th-century Spanish painters under one roof. The complementary program includes guided tours, three lectures and a concert.

https://cultura.cervantes.es/losangeles/en-US/portrait-of-mariana-de-austria/174560

FREE PERFORMANCE (with museum admission): 03/22/2025 at 17:00 – 18:00 (5:00-6:00)

This piece was written by the Los Angeles–based Spanish composer Martí Noguer especially for the Museum’s presentation of Velázquez’s painting. The performance features two musicians from Spain: violist Albert Coronado Daza, a 2024 member of the Spanish Young Music Talents program, and harpist Cristina Montes Mateo, principal harpist for the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra.

Free with museum admission. Doors open 30 minutes before program. Advance ticket-holders may check in at the Membership Desk between 12:00 p.m. and 4:45 p.m. to receive a sticker for their seat (seating is not assigned). Everyone must be seated no later than 4:50 p.m. Guests who are not in their seat by 4:50 p.m. may forfeit their ticket.

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Queen Mariana of Austria wears a stunning black-and-silver dress in Velázquez’s iconic portrait. Did dresses like this really exist? If so, how were they made? And what was it like to wear them? In this lecture, the author of Spanish Fashion in the Age of Velázquez explores the materials and techniques that went into making courtly dresses in 17th-century Spain and reveals the hidden undergarments that created the queen’s unnatural silhouette. Lifting the curtain from the portrait, Amanda Wunder introduces the skilled court artisans who worked behind the scenes to dress the Spanish queen and brings to life the flesh-and-blood woman who lived behind the mask-like makeup and heavy wig in Velázquez’s famous painting.

More information on this, and related programs: https://cultura.cervantes.es/losangeles/en-US/mariana.-retrato-de-una-reina/174442

Sponsored by: Instituto Cervantes de LOS ÁNGELES

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Amanda Wunder —autora de La moda española en la época de Velázquez—, indagará en los materiales y técnicas que se utilizaron para crear los trajes cortesanos en la España del siglo XVII y desvelará las prendas ocultas que daban forma a la silueta de la reina, entre otros detalles sobre la vida de esta fascinante mujer que protagonizó el famoso cuadro de Velázquez.

La exposición, que estará abierta al público hasta el 24 de marzo, tiene como objetivo mostrar la relación entre el retrato y la vida de Mariana de Austria, así como la imagen que proyectó al mundo al asumir su nuevo rol político.