Velázquez, Painter & Curator

Book excerpt: This book is the first to address the curatorial career of Diego Velázquez, painter to King Philip IV of Spain and chamberlain of his royal palace. It investigates the role that Velázquez played in overseeing the display of the Habsburg art collection, then the richest in the western world, and the role, in turn, that this practice played in his creative trajectory between his arrival at the Spanish court in 1623 and his death in 1660. This book thus recasts Velázquez’s career as an episode in the history of the curator.