Description
The Museu Picasso is a museum of Pablo Picasso's early years, in five medieval palaces on Carrer de Montcada in La Ribera, Barcelona's old town. It holds 4,251 works, mostly from his youth, and it shows how a gifted schoolboy turned into Picasso.
Do not come looking for Guernica or for much late work: the collection is about the young artist and his ties to the city. The surprise is another: watching, room after room, the schoolboy become the master. The highlights are two of his first major works, The First Communion (1896) and Science and Charity (1897).
Another highlight is the Las Meninas series: 58 paintings in which, in 1957, he took apart Velázquez's masterpiece again and again. The museum also holds the works of his Blue Period and the school notebooks and academic pieces that his family kept for him.
The collection also reflects the museum's friends. Donations came from Picasso's widow, from galleries and from collectors: in 1983 the Louise Leiris Gallery gave 117 engravings.
The five palaces are Gothic civil architecture of the 13th and 14th centuries, each built around a courtyard with an open staircase. Walking through them is as much a part of the visit as the art.
The museum opened in 1963 as the "Sabartés Collection". Picasso, a fierce opponent of Franco's regime, objected to a museum under his own name. It was the first museum devoted to him, and the only one created in his lifetime.
The idea came from Jaume Sabartés, his friend since 1899 and later his secretary, who wanted to found it in Málaga, Picasso's birthplace. Picasso suggested Barcelona, where he had moved with his family at fourteen and made his first friends.
Barcelona's mayor defied the central government to open it, with 574 works from Sabartés. In 1970 Picasso himself donated another 920 pieces, including those school books and Blue Period canvases, and the collection kept growing, with a new building later added behind the street.
In 1960 restorers found a 13th-century mural of the conquest of Majorca under the plaster of the first palace. It is now in the National Art Museum of Catalonia, and it shows the courtyard of the building in the 15th century.
Don't miss
• The First Communion and Science and Charity.
• The Las Meninas series.
• The Blue Period works.
• The Gothic courtyards.
Did you know?
• Salvador Dalí was among the first donors: he gave Picasso's engravings for Ovid's Metamorphoses.
• Picasso's widow, Jacqueline Roque, donated 41 pieces in 1982.
Do not come looking for Guernica or for much late work: the collection is about the young artist and his ties to the city. The surprise is another: watching, room after room, the schoolboy become the master. The highlights are two of his first major works, The First Communion (1896) and Science and Charity (1897).
Another highlight is the Las Meninas series: 58 paintings in which, in 1957, he took apart Velázquez's masterpiece again and again. The museum also holds the works of his Blue Period and the school notebooks and academic pieces that his family kept for him.
The collection also reflects the museum's friends. Donations came from Picasso's widow, from galleries and from collectors: in 1983 the Louise Leiris Gallery gave 117 engravings.
The five palaces are Gothic civil architecture of the 13th and 14th centuries, each built around a courtyard with an open staircase. Walking through them is as much a part of the visit as the art.
The museum opened in 1963 as the "Sabartés Collection". Picasso, a fierce opponent of Franco's regime, objected to a museum under his own name. It was the first museum devoted to him, and the only one created in his lifetime.
The idea came from Jaume Sabartés, his friend since 1899 and later his secretary, who wanted to found it in Málaga, Picasso's birthplace. Picasso suggested Barcelona, where he had moved with his family at fourteen and made his first friends.
Barcelona's mayor defied the central government to open it, with 574 works from Sabartés. In 1970 Picasso himself donated another 920 pieces, including those school books and Blue Period canvases, and the collection kept growing, with a new building later added behind the street.
In 1960 restorers found a 13th-century mural of the conquest of Majorca under the plaster of the first palace. It is now in the National Art Museum of Catalonia, and it shows the courtyard of the building in the 15th century.
Don't miss
• The First Communion and Science and Charity.
• The Las Meninas series.
• The Blue Period works.
• The Gothic courtyards.
Did you know?
• Salvador Dalí was among the first donors: he gave Picasso's engravings for Ovid's Metamorphoses.
• Picasso's widow, Jacqueline Roque, donated 41 pieces in 1982.