2 for 1 entry ticket and audio guide for ‘The Sacred Made Real’

This autumn the National Gallery, London, will showcase a groundbreaking exhibition of painting and polychrome sculpture by the great Spanish realists of the 17th century and to celebrate they are offering 2 for 1 entry combined adult ticket and audio guide (£11 for two people rather than £11 each) for ‘The Sacred Made Real’ when purchased for entry times from 16.30 to 17.30 on Fridays

The exhibition will demonstrate that in this period the two disciplines of painting and sculpture were intimately linked and interdependent in their quest to bring religious subjects to life. Although the sculptors on which this exhibition will focus - Gregorio Fernández, Juan Martínez Montañés, Juan de Mesa, Alonso Cano, Manuel Pereira, Pedro de Mena and José de Mora - were highly praised in their day, Spanish polychromed sculpture remains an art form that is completely unfamiliar outside Spain today.

This exhibition will provide an opportunity to re-appraise this aspect of Spanish art by installing important pieces of sculpture alongside the great Spanish paintings of the period, such as the celebrated Crucifixion by Zurbarán from the Art Institute of Chicago as well as the National Gallery’s Saint Francis in Meditation by Zurbáran and Velázquez’s Christ at the Column.

There will also be a Room 1 exhibition focusing on the making of Francisco Antonio Gijon’s sculpture of Saint John of the Cross from the National Gallery of Art, Washington.