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Behind Closed Doors: Art in the Spanish American Home, 1492-1898 is the first major exhibition in the United States to explore the private lives and interiors of Spain’s New World elite from 1492 through the nineteenth century, focusing on the house as a principal repository of fine and decorative art. Through approximately 160 paintings, sculptures, prints, textiles, and decorative art objects, this exhibition presents for the first time American, European, and Asian luxury goods from everyday life as signifiers of the faith, wealth, taste, and socio-racial standing of their consumers. The exhibition explores themes including representations of the indigenous and Creole elite, rituals in the home, the sala de estrado (women’s sitting room), the bedchamber, and social identity through material culture.
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Dona Mariana Belsunse Y Salasar
18th Century
Attributed to Pedro Jose Diaz
Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. L. H. Shearman
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Dona Maria de los Dolores Gutierrez del Mazo Y Perez
1796
Jose Campeche
Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Lilla Brown in memory of her husband, John W. Brown, by exchange
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Portrait of Don Tadeo Bravo de Rivero
1806
Francisco de Goya y Lucientes
Gift of the executors of the estate of Colonel Michael Friedsam
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Deborah Hall
1766
William Williams
Brooklyn Museum, Dick S. Ramsay Fund
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Casket or Small Cabinet
1677
Brooklyn Museum, Carl H. de Silver Fund
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Don Juan Xavier Joachin Gutierrez Altamirano Velasco, Count of Santiago de Calimaya
Circa 1752
Miguel Cabrera
Brooklyn Museum, Museum Collection Fund and the Dick S. Ramsay Fund
Sponsors / Partners
Behind Closed Doors: Art in the Spanish American Home, 1492–1898 is organized by the Brooklyn Museum. Generous support for this exhibition has been provided by National Endowment for the Humanities. The New Orleans presentation is underwritten by the Zemurray Foundation, with additional support provided by Pan-American Life Insurance Group