Our Terrifying Visit to the Modern Art Museum

Today, on our first full day in Madrid, we spent the morning at Spain’s lavish Royal Palace. After lunch and a stop at the playground we went to the Reina Sophia Museum. Madrid’s modern art museum, focusing on the years 1900-1965ish. Artist heavy-weights include Picasso, Dali, and Miro, plus a handful of post-impressionists. Because of the time and place the art in the collection was created many pieces focus on the changes the 20^th century brought to the world, the struggles of Europe and the first and second World Wars. By far the most famous piece is the hauntingly beautiful painting "Guernica" by Pablo Picasso. It depicts the carnage of the people in the town of Guernica after Franco allowed Hitler to use the town to test new bombs. It is moving, and it opened the eyes of a generation to the realities of modern warfare.

Our kids are generally good in museums. They kind of enjoy looking at the various art, and we try to engage them in conversations about various paintings. This visit did not go as planned. In the very first room, Sebastian excited about a painting that looked like a mermaid, walked up to it to point something out to me and touched it. Breaking the cardinal rule of museums everywhere. Gardner, I and the guard all loudly, and in unison said “NO”. My sweet, sensitive son was so embarrassed by his overly-enthusiastic response that his little eyes welled-up as he tried in vain to hold back tears. I hugged him and told him it was ok, and tried to comfort him. His little lip was still a bit shaky as we entered room two.

The curator of the museum has done something unique and interesting. They have paired short video clips made during the time the paintings were created, near the art. So in the second room, the paintings were mostly circa 1915-1920. Off to the side there is a little black and white picture showing “Un Chien Andalou” (co-directed by Salvador Dali). Gardner leads us in, a perfect distraction to move past a moment of embarrassment, or so he thought. The movie starts. It’s a man, getting ready to shave. He is in his undershirt, running the water, sharpening the old-fashioned razor. Everything is great. And then all of a sudden, out of nowhere there is a close-up of a women’s eye and the man is cutting through her eyeball with the blade. Now this is 1915’s graphics, so not super-realistic, but of course our hands fly-up over the kids eyes, and we rush them out of the area. Everett was pretty unphazed, but poor Sebastian was so affected. He talked about it the whole rest of the visit. Of course we feel terrible and so guilty, although there was no way to know the image would be violent. Clearly the intention was shock-value. He rebounded and we had a long conversation about movies not being real, and how sometimes art is intended to surprise people and to make them feel a particular way. Then we came “home” and made a dream-catcher for over his bed tonight. Hopefully my little man hasn’t been scarred for life. We are going to the Prado tomorrow, and Sebastian made us promise that there won’t be any movies there.

Now we are headed out for dinner. Hopefully some paella and a yummy dessert will wash away any bad dreams. You can’t protect your kids from everything, in the world as hard as you might try, but I feel bad about this one. Not winning any parenting awards tonight.

Update: Poor Sebastian. It’s midnight and he is still awake. He says he is going to lay awake in bed all night. :(