EXPERTS in Spanish Golden Age art will take part in a three-day conference at the Bowes Museum next month as part of a move aimed at making the county a leading centre for paintings of this era.

Exhibitions at the Bowes Museum and Auckland Castle will include newly discovered and restored works of Spanish art alongside loans from the National Gallery and Museo del Prado.

Four public lectures are planned between November and February, two at Auckland Castle and two at the Bowes Museum, to be delivered by leading academics.

The events are linked to the bicentenary of the arrival of Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus in Teesdale and form part of a long-term project by Durham University, the Bowes and Auckland Castle, backed by the National Gallery and Museo del Prado, to make the county an international academic and tourist destination focused around Spanish art.

The three County Durham venues house between them the biggest pool of Golden Age Spanish art outside London.

Dr Chris Ferguson, Auckland Castle’s head curator, said: “This conference and the exhibitions at Auckland Castle and the Bowes Museum are the beginning of our exciting project to make Spanish art accessible to the people of the North East and beyond."

The museum has 76 works by Spanish artists and is the best place in the UK after the National Gallery to explore the genre.

Auckland Castle is famous for the series of 17th century paintings, Jacob and his 12 Sons, by the Spanish master Francisco de Zurbarán, which have hung in the former home of the Bishops of Durham for 250 years.

Jonathan Ruffer, chairman of Auckland Castle Trust, who was pivotal in preventing them from being sold a few years ago, is a patron of the Friends of the Prado Museum Charity.

Important works of Spanish art also held at Ushaw College, Durham Castle and Durham Cathedral.

The symposium, Paintings of the Spanish Golden Age: The Collections of County Durham, from October 23-25, will highlight the importance of the works.

An exhibition at Auckland Castle will feature the Zurbaráns alongside 17th century Sevillian paintings of the apostles brought to Durham Cathedral in 1753, recently rediscovered after being missing for 40 years.

Spanish pictures from Ushaw College collection will be on display for the first time, and the Bowes Museum will exhibit six pieces focusing on Francisco Pacheco’s The Last Communion of Saint Raymond Nonnatus alongside loaned works, including Zurbarán’s The Martyrdom of Saint James and Juan van der Hamen y León’s Still Life with Artichokes, Flowers and Glass Vessels from the Museo del Prado.

Zurbarán’s Saint Francis in Meditation and Juan de Valdés Leal’s The Immaculate Conception with Two Donors from the National Gallery will also feature.