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Polly Rider
10 October 2016
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Pablo Ruiz Picasso was perhaps the most important artistic figure of the 20th century. A Spanish expatriate, notorious womanizer, and co-creator of cubism, there’s no wonder that ‘The Master’ has left an enduring legacy in his wake. We look at eight cities in Europe that house intriguing and influential collections of Picasso’s masterpieces.
Barcelona – Museu Picasso | © Jaime.Silva/Flickr
Barcelona, Spain
Museum
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Pablo Picasso, Lucerne | © Michael Dawes/Flickr
Barcelona is home to the Museu Picasso, which houses one of the most extensive collections of Picasso’s work. He lived in the city during his formative years as an artist, between the ages of 14 and 24. The museum opened in 1963 and was founded on a donation of 574 works by Picasso’s secretary, Jaime Sabartés. The collection includes several early paintings preceding the beginning of his Blue Period in 1905. In 1970, Picasso left further bequests to the museum, and the total count is now well over 3,000 pieces. The setting of this museum alone, in five contiguous medieval stone mansions, makes the Museu Picasso unique. Allegedly, it was Picasso himself who proposed the museum’s creation in 1960 to Sabartés, a Barcelona native. Picasso’s widow, Jacqueline Roque, donated 41 ceramic pieces and the painting ‘Woman with Bonnet’ after Picasso’s death.
Highlights of the Museu Picasso: The artist’s first major works, ‘The First Communion’ (1896) and ‘Science & Charity’ (1897), as well as a portrait of his mother and father
Lucerne, Switzerland
Museum
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Musee Picasso, Antibes | © Jane Catherine/Flickr
Art dealer Siegfried Rosengart moved to Lucerne, Switzerland, after the First World War and was a friend of many leading artists, including the likes of Matisse, Klee, and Picasso. Rosengart amassed an extraordinary collection, which he and his daughter Angela donated to the town of Lucerne, now housed in the museum named in his honor. Angela, now in her 80s, still runs Museum Sammlung Rosengart, which is housed in a former bank building. The whole ground floor and some of the first floor rooms are dedicated to Picasso. The collection also features some remarkable photos of him at work by David Douglas Duncan, as well as 32 paintings and 100 drawings, watercolors, graphic and sculptural works, including five portraits of Angela herself. The hall, which was once the bank’s main concourse, is now home to five extraordinary oil paintings dating from 1967 to 1969. These were long rejected by the collection because of their powerful and passionate swirling style and expressive choice of colors by the artist. These works, once seen as scandalous, are now prized for their innovation.
Highlights of the Museum Sammlung Rosengart: ‘Portrait of a Painter’, which marked a transition in Picasso’s work, and ‘The Man with Pipe’ series from the late 1960s
Antibes, Southern France
Building, Museum
The Musée Picasso in Antibes, is situated in a beautiful location on Côte d’Azur, France, in a stunning medieval chateau. Picasso used the château as a studio in the autumn of 1946. He had stayed in the village of Golfe-Juan with his lover Françoise Gilot, where he produced a new work almost every night, creating around 23 paintings and 44 drawings. Picasso went on to donate all of the work that he had done here back to the château on the condition that it remained on display to the public. This was the first museum to be dedicated to the artist and was built on the foundations of the ancient Greek town of Antipolis. The extensive collection here includes painting of mythical beasts and Mediterranean sea images as well as a wonderful collection of ceramics.
Highlight of the Musée Picasso: ‘Joie de Vivre’ (1946), which best captures the mood of Picasso in this period, depicting a naked model dancing to pipes on the beach with a summery palette of light blues and yellows
Málaga, Spain
Museum, Building
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Picasso’s birthplace was an apartment block in Málaga, which has since been converted into a foundation in his honor, organizing exhibitions and educational projects in Picasso’s name. The building houses a series of rooms displaying memento’s of his family life, photographs and some of his paintings and drawings. Inside, there’s a recreation of the Ruiz Picasso family’s reception hall, and visitors can see images of family members and learn about the artist’s childhood. A bigger collection of Picasso’s work is in the Museo Picasso Malaga, which opened in 2003 in the Buena Vista Palace. It holds 285 works donated by members of Picasso’s family or held on permanent loan.
Highlights of the Museo Picasso: Early academic studies, examples of his cubist phase, and some of his last paintings from the 1970s
Vallauris, South-eastern France
Picasso briefly lived in Vallauris, the seaside village where he learnt the art of decorative ceramics. In 1952 he painted his famous mural on war and peace to decorate the chapel here, which remains open to the public. This is where Picasso developed his fascination with ceramics. However, his approach to the art was unorthodox, fashioning fauna and nymphs in the glaze, melting the clay like one melts bronze, and decorating plates and dished with his favorite subjects.
Highlight of the Musée National Picasso: ‘War and Peace.’ Picasso produced two compositions of monumental proportions on hardboard panels that mirrored the curvature of the vaulting.
Musée National Picasso, Place de la Libération, 06220 Vallauris, France +33 4 93 64 16 05
Paris, France
Museum, Art Gallery
Paris’s Musée Picasso reopened in October 2014, when Picasso would have turned 133, with more of the master’s works on display than ever. The exhibition space has been doubled in size and the layout simplified. The museum has double appeal for visitors, with not only a superb collection, but also the stunning Marais mansion in which it is housed. The building was built in the 1650s for Pierre Aubert de Fontenay, collector of the gabelle, or salt tax, which gave the building its nickname, Hôtel Salé. The paintings are hung alongside sculptures, prints and drawings, which allows one to put the focus on the work process, the step from drawing to painting and the intensity of the creative process. The rooms are grouped thematically: showcasing self portraits, guitars, and portraits of women.
Highlight of Musée Picasso: Some of Picasso’s earliest works as a teenager in Spain, including ‘The Little Girl in a Red Dress’ (1895), painted when he was about 14 years old
Madrid, Spain
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The Reina Sofia Museum, in Madrid, displays modern and contemporary Spanish art and has a holding of about 100 works by Picasso. Many of the works here are studies and drawings for ‘Guernica,’ Picasso’s epic homage to the victims of the bombing of the Basque village in 1937 that remains an emotive reminder of the conflict and the division and suffering of Spain during the civil war and the Franco Regime.
Highlight of the Reina Sofia Museum: The 20th century’s most famous painting, Picasso’s ‘Guernica’, commissioned by the Spanish government. It was Picasso’s wish that it should not be shown in Spain until democracy was established. It was then exhibited at the Prado and moved to this permanent home in 1992.
Cologne, Germany
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The Museum Ludwig in Cologne houses works from most of the key 20th century movements from pop art to the Russian avant garde and American abstract artists. The German museum holds a whopping 864 works by Picasso, an enviable collection which has lead to its fame. After Paris and Barcelona, this is the world’s third largest collection of his works. The work here represents all key phases of his paintings, as well as a large collection of his drawings, sculptures, ceramics, and graphics. Throughout his lifetime, Picasso placed a great deal of value in drawing and graphics within his oeuvre. This is demonstrated in the Museum Ludwig collection; it is the only public institution to own all three large print cycles by the master – ‘The Vollard Suite’ (1930-1937), ‘Suite 345’ (1968) and ‘Suite 156’ (1971).
Highlights of Museum Ludwig: ‘Harlequin’ (1923) and ‘Woman With Artichoke’ (1941)
FAQs
Where is most of Picasso's art? ›
Barcelona is home to the Museu Picasso, which houses one of the most extensive collections of Picasso's work.
Where can you see Picasso's art? ›| Museo Picasso de Barcelona | |
|---|---|
| Location | Montcada Street, Barcelona, Spain |
| Coordinates | 41.385216°N 2.180893°E |
| Type | art museum |
| Visitors | 1,045,837 (2010) |
His real name is Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Martyr Patricio Clito Ruíz y Picasso. Mine has only 9 letters...
Which museum has the most Picasso? ›Picasso Museum, Paris France
It's the largest public Picasso collection in the world.
Picasso: history intervenes (1939–1945)
In this context, Paul Jamot, former head of the Louvre's Department of Paintings, entrusted much of his collection to the Louvre, including in particular two drawings by Picasso, Woman with a Large Hat (1901) and The Vagabond (1901).
Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973) | National Gallery, London.
Where can I see Picasso in New York? ›New York, Museum of Modern Art.
What is Pablo Picasso's most expensive painting? ›One fine evening in New York, renowned artist Pablo Picasso's painting sold for a world record $106,482,500. The year was 2010 and the painting called 'Nude, Green Leaves and Bust' became the most expensive Picasso painting ever sold.
Is there Picasso at the Met? ›Picasso in The Metropolitcan Museum of Art features three hundred works, including the Museum's complete holdings of paintings, drawings, sculptures, and ceramics by Picasso—never before seen in their entirety—as well as a selection of the artist's prints.
Who inherited Picasso's fortune? ›Officially, there is only one legitimate heir to his vast inheritance: his granddaughter Marina Ruiz-Picasso. The artist had his first child, Paulo, with Russian dancer Olga Khokhlova, whom he married in 1918 during the First World War.
Where is Picasso's Dove of Peace? ›
The image was used to illustrate a poster at the 1949 Paris Peace Congress and also became an iconographic image of the period, known as "The dove of peace". An example is housed in the collection of the Tate Gallery and MOMA. Since then, it has been considered a masterpiece.
How much are tickets to the Picasso Museum in Paris? › What was Picasso's first painting? ›Well, look at what Pablo Picasso did at age 9 Picasso completed his first painting : Le picador a man riding a horse in a bullfight. His first major painting, an “academic” work is First Communion featuring a portrait of his father, mother, and younger sister kneeling before an altar.
Why is Picasso a genius? ›Intense, provocative, disturbing, and captivating, the legendary artist led a life of restless brilliance. Picasso never stopped reinventing his artistic style, and nothing was out of reach. He created thousands of paintings, sculptures, ceramics, watercolors, and engravings.
How many pieces did Picasso create? ›However, during Picasso's long life -- he died in 1973 at age 91 -- he is estimated to have completed 13,500 paintings and around 100,000 prints and engravings. A comprehensive retrospective of his work and the numerous artistic traditions it spanned, is a massive undertaking.
What is the most valuable item in the Louvre? ›On permanent display at the Louvre in Paris, the Mona Lisa was assessed at US$100 million on December 14, 1962.
Is the Last Supper at the Louvre? ›a painting entitled The Last Supper which is also called "La Great Supper » and which is in the Louvre Museum.
Is Picasso in Musee d Orsay? ›INTRO. Picasso: Bleu et Rose, which is jointly organized by Musée d'Orsay and the Musée National Picasso-Paris, opened on September 18th at Musée d'Orsay. This large-scale exhibition features the blue and the rose period of Pablo Picasso, bringing together his masterpieces from 1900 to 1906.
Is Picasso in Tate Modern? ›Matisse Picasso at Tate Modern brings together major masterpieces by the two giants of modern art. Between them Matisse and Picasso originated many of the most significant developments of twentieth-century painting and sculpture.
Which museum in Madrid has Picasso? ›Pablo Picasso's La Guernica may just be one of the most famous modern art masterpieces in the world, and you can see it at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía.
How many Picasso museums are there? ›
In fact there are currently six fantastic Picasso Museums in Europe (and a seventh on the way!). All of them are dedicated to the Spaniard himself! Most of the Picasso museums were established to celebrate the life of Pablo Picasso in that region. For example, Picasso was born in Malaga.
Who inherited Picasso's fortune? ›Officially, there is only one legitimate heir to his vast inheritance: his granddaughter Marina Ruiz-Picasso. The artist had his first child, Paulo, with Russian dancer Olga Khokhlova, whom he married in 1918 during the First World War.
Where is Picasso's Dove of Peace? ›The image was used to illustrate a poster at the 1949 Paris Peace Congress and also became an iconographic image of the period, known as "The dove of peace". An example is housed in the collection of the Tate Gallery and MOMA. Since then, it has been considered a masterpiece.
How many Picasso paintings are there? ›However, during Picasso's long life -- he died in 1973 at age 91 -- he is estimated to have completed 13,500 paintings and around 100,000 prints and engravings. A comprehensive retrospective of his work and the numerous artistic traditions it spanned, is a massive undertaking.
Is Picasso Museum free? ›Yes, the Picasso Museum in Barcelona offers free admission: every Thursday afternoon from 6pm to 9.30pm. the first Sunday of every month from 9 am to 7 pm. and during the open days: February 12, May 18 and September 24.
How long does it take to see the Picasso Museum? ›The duration of the museum visit depends on the rhythm of each visitor. On average, we recommend spending between 90 minutes to 2 hours to discover all of the collections and exhibitions. How much time do I need to visit the Museum?
How much are tickets to the Picasso Museum in Paris? › What was Picasso worth at death? ›What was Pablo Picasso's Net Worth? Pablo Picasso was a world-renowned Spanish artist who lived from 1881 to 1973. According to a court appointed auditor who has charged with evaluating every asset in the late artist's estate, at the time of his death Pablo Picasso's net worth was between $100 and $250 million.
Who is the richest painter alive? ›Jasper Johns is a painter that holds the title for the most expensive painting by any living artist. Jasper has been delivering remarkable projects throughout his career and he continues to do the same.
Who is the richest painter? ›John Currin
John Currin is currently the richest painter in the world, with an estimated worth of a whopping $1.4 billion thanks to his unique and sought-after painting style.
Why is a dove a symbol of peace? ›
A: There is a theory that doves derive their symbolism from the biblical episode of Noah's Ark and the great flood in which doves appeared as a harbinger of peace. It is also said that the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso's use of doves in his works contributed to the widespread recognition of their symbolism for peace.
What does the peace dove have in its mouth? ›That sprig of green is mean to be an olive branch. In the Old Testament of the Bible, a dove appears to Noah, a profit God saved from a global flood sent to cleanse the Earth of sin. Noah sends a dove out from his ark and the dove returns with an olive branch in its beak showing the flood waters have gone down.
Is dove a symbol of peace? ›The dove has been a symbol of peace and innocence for thousands of years in many different cultures. In ancient Greek mythology it was a symbol of love and the renewal of life and in ancient Japan a dove carrying a sword symbolised the end of war.
What was Picasso's first word? ›Picasso's first word was 'lapiz', which is Spanish for pencil. With a father who also worked as a painter, it was expected that art would be in Picasso's blood and his first word merely proved that fact.
How much does a real Picasso cost? ›On average, the cheapest Picasso painting costs around $120,000, while the most expensive could be up to $140 million.
How much is an original Picasso worth? ›Pablo Picasso paintings are worth millions of dollars, ranging up into the hundreds of millions for major works. This is reflective of his place in the pantheon of great art from the 20th century. Multiple paintings have sold for hundreds of millions of dollars.