The Picasso Museum - Attractions Spotlight

The Picasso Museum in the district of La Ribera is one of the most popular attractions of Barcelona. It is located in five mercantile houses which are connected and all have beautiful courtyards. The main entrance is in the Palau Berenguer d'Aguilar of the 15th century.

The museum gives a nice overview of the development of Pablo Picasso. His works hang in chronological order. The museum has many pieces from his earlier period, when he lived and worked in Barcelona.

There are also many works that Picasso made in his last period. The period 1907 - 1937 is less well represented. Unfortunately, because in this period he made very famous works. The real masterpieces you will not find in this museum, but the exhibition gives a good insight into how Picasso developed his own style.

Besides paintings, the museum holds items of ceramics and graphic work of Picasso. In a separate section of the museum you can see the changing exhibitions, but you have to pay an extra price for this. The museum is situated at Montcada 15-23, 08003 Barcelona. Opening hours: 10.00 - 20.00 (Monday closed) Price: €6.

The Joan Miro museum (el Fundació Joan Miró)

The Miró museum is a museum of modern art in Barcelona. The museum was built by Josep Lluis Sert, a friend of Miro, and was officially opened on the 10th of June in 1975. It has many paintings and sculptures by Joan Miró, but also from other modern artists.

The museum is owned by the Fundació Joan Miró and contains more than 200 paintings by Miró. The Most of these works are donated to the museum by Miro itself or by his wife. The museum includes also a library with more than 25,000 books and catalogs, audiovisual items and newspapers.

Joan Miró was born in 1893 in the Spanish Montroig, near Barcelona. Miró was a Catalan, Spanish painter, sculptor, graphic artist and ceramist. From childhood he began to draw, but later he also made paintings, sculptures, textile work, theatrical and monumental sculptures. Miro art is known for its original style and one of the big three, next to Picasso and Dalí, of the Spanish 20th-century Modern art. He is also seen as one of the most visual artists of the 20th century by many art critics. He worked in different styles and in his younger years he was inspired by the impressionistic work of Van Gogh. But after his meeting with Pablo Picasso, he changed for a small period to the Cubism style.

Finally, Joan Miró created, by the influence of surrealist writers and painters, a distinctive and unique style and is counted by the art of surrealism. This unique style of painting is a style that was never practiced by other people.

This style includes that the artist disconnects the technical objects of a spontaneous poetic dream world of their original function to enable them to integrate them in a graphic world. These organic figures world was dominated by the sexual issues, nature, the moon, the star, but also women. Spontaneous spring poetry is the main show.Joan Miró died in 1983 at an age of 93 years.

The museum Fundació Joan Miró is situated on the mountain Montjuic in Barcelona.