Madrid residents wearing face masks queued two metres apart to be among the first visitors back in the city’s famed galleries, as the Prado, Reina Sofia and Thyssen-Bornemisza museums reopened after nearly three months of coronavirus lockdown.

“I was really looking forward to coming back. To see how it has come back to life makes me very emotional,” said masters student Alejandro Elizalde, who wiped away tears while viewing Diego de Velazquez’s “Las Meninas”, one of the Prado’s most famous paintings.

The Spanish government had shut state-run museums on March 12 as it locked down the country to curb the coronavirus spread.

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