Elena Gocmen Rueda
MADRID’S world-famous Prado museum has just cashed in to the tune of €3.2 million after selling a home bequeathed to it by a long term curator.
Juan Jose Luna, held the post from 1980 until his retirement in 2016. In 1995 he willed all his assets to the Prado, which he had been linked to since 1969.
These included an art collection of more than 700 drawings and prints, 50 oil paintings and some furniture. It also included a house in the historic heart of Madrid, which has just been sold at auction for €3.2 million a year after his death at the age of 74.
Of his art collection, some of the most important works are French prints from the 17th and 18th century.
Although there are few Spanish prints, there are some of notable interest such as the ‘Allegory of the Execution of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette’, from 1795.
A collection of sketches is mainly Spanish with a few drawings from the 17th century.
For Luna, the Prado was ‘a centre that is very close to me, because of the history it unfolds, the treasures it holds and because it has determined my life for a long time’.
He held a PhD in Philosophy and Letters from the Complutense University of Madrid.
In 1986 he was appointed head of department, first of French, English and German painting and from 2003 of 18th-century painting.
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