NEW Masterpieces of Early-Modern Spain: A Study Tour to Madrid and Toledo
Study Tours
Dr Maeve O’Donnell-Morales
Sunday 1 – Thursday 5 November 2026
£82
Tour Description
This five-day trip to Madrid and Toledo traces a path through a century and a half of revolutionary painting in the heart of Spain. Participants will visit some of the most renowned art collections in the world, including, but not limited to, the Prado, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection and the Royal Collections Gallery, and come face-to-face with the genius of El Greco, Diego Velázquez, Francisco de Zurbarán, Jusepe de Ribera, and Francisco Goya.
We will seek to understand these innovative masters of early modern Spanish art in the contexts of the historical moments that produced them and the cultural landscapes in which they operated. We shall also investigate the conditions that made Madrid and its environs into such fertile soil for these artists, exploring the impact on local artists of both imported Northern works such as Hieronymus Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights, and of the great medieval monuments of nearby Toledo. A day-trip to Toledo, Castile’s first capital, will help draw out the impact of landscape, built environment and history on the development of Spanish early modern masters like El Greco, whose artistic development was greatly shaped by the city’s medieval fabric.
In addition to marvelling at great paintings in the company of fellow art enthusiasts, this trip will thus encourage students to consider the evolution of Spanish culture through the eyes of its most revolutionary painters.
Lecturer's Biography
Dr Maeve O’Donnell-Morales completed her PhD at the Courtauld in 2018, writing a thesis on medieval altar furnishings and liturgical objects from the Iberian kingdom of Castile. Before moving to London for her PhD, Maeve completed her MA at Hunter College (CUNY) and her BA at New York University and worked for four years at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Following her PhD, Maeve curated an exhibition on the role of artists in the development of Marian theology at the Getty Museum (www.getty.edu/news/getty-museum-presents-visualizing-the-virgin-mary/ ). Returning to England, she became the art historian on a team investigating the development of cults of saints in medieval Iberia at the University of Bristol. She is currently at Teaching Fellow at the Courtauld and a Research Fellow at the University of Bristol and is completing several articles and designing courses on a variety of art history subjects.