Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya

History

The history of the institution dates back to the 19th century, when, in accordance with the principles that inspired Catalonia's cultural and political Renaixença (renaissance), a movement particularly active in that century, many projects were launched to help revive and conserve the country's artistic heritage. This process began with the establishment of the Museu Provincial d'Antiguitats de Barcelona (Barcelona Provincial Museum of Antiquities) in the Chapel of St Agatha (1880) and the Museu Municipal de Belles Arts de Barcelona (Municipal Fine Art Museum) in the Palau de les Belles Arts (1891), a palace built to mark the occasion of the 1888 Universal Exhibition. A project to install all these Catalan art collections in the Palau Nacional, launched in 1934 under the initiative of Joaquim Folch i Torres, the first director of Catalonia Museum of Art, was frustrated by the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), when for protection many works were transferred to Olot, Darnius and Paris (where an important exhibit was established). During the postwar period, the 19th- and 20th-century collections were installed in the Museu d'Art Modern (now the Modern Art Collection MNAC within the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya), housed from 1945 to 2004 in the Arsenal building in Barcelona's Parc de la Ciutadella, whilst the Romanesque, Gothic and baroque collections were installed in the Palau in 1942.

The Palau Nacional, which has housed the Museu d'Art de Catalunya since 1934, was declared a national museum in 1990 under the Museums Law passed by the Catalan Government. In 1992 a thorough renovation process was launched to refurbish the site, based on plans drawn up by the architects Gae Aulenti and Enric Steegmann, who were later joined in the undertaking by Josep Benedito. The Oval Hall was reopened in 1992 on the occasion of the Olympic Games, and the various collections were installed and opened over the period from 1995 (when the Romanesque Art section was reopened) to 2004. The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya (Museu Nacional) was officially inaugurated on 16 December 2004.

Since 2004, the Palau Nacional has once more housed several magnificent art collections, mostly by Catalan art, but also Spanish and European art. The works from that first museum have now been enriched by new purchases and donations, tracing the country's art history from early medieval times to the mid-20th century: from Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and baroque to modern art. This heritage is completed by the Gabinet Numismàtic de Catalunya (coin and medal collections), the Gabinet de Dibuixos i Gravats (drawings and engravings) and the library.

Collections

Romanesque Art

With a series of important Romanesque murals, the Romanesque collection is one of the most important in the museum. Indeed, the Museu Nacional Romanesque Collection is unmatched by any other museum in the world. Dating to the 11th to 13th centuries, many of the works originally adorned rural churches in the Pyrenees and other sites in Old Catalonia, or Catalunya Vella in Catalan. The works began to be discovered and studied in the early 20th century, particularly after a Pyrenean expedition in 1907 by the Institut d'Estudis Catalans (Institute of Catalan Studies). The expedition published its findings in Les pintures murals catalanes (Catalan Mural Paintings, 1907–1921).

In the early 1920s many of the Pyrenean murals were moved to Barcelona as a consequence of the actions of an American art dealer in 1919. The art dealer purchased many of the frescos at the former monastery in Castell de Mur, intending to sell them for a profit. The dealer brought in two Italian art restorers who were experts at detaching wall paintings, a technique called "strappo". The frescos were sent to the United States, and they now reside in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. There were no laws in Spain forbidding the removal and expatriation of the art, but the shipment of the monastery murals to the United States alarmed the Junta de Museus de Catalunya (Catalan Board of Museums). The Board developed plans to conserve the murals. Hiring the Italian experts, from 1919 to 1923 they successfully intervened to detach many of the ecclesiastical frescos from the rural churches in the Pyrenees and transfer them to the Museum of Barcelona, then housed in the Parc de la Ciutadella. The Romanesque works were thus conserved and protected, and the collection is considered a unique art heritage and a symbol of the birth and formation of Catalonia.

The Romanesque rooms are arranged in chronological and stylistic order, giving visitors a view of the different tendencies in Catalan Romanesque art and featuring works produced, for the most part, in the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries.

The visit to this section begins with the mural paintings from Sant Joan in Boí, which show clear stylistic influences from the French Carolingian tradition, and then continues with works showing the Italian influence that dominated painting from the late 11th century, doubtless as a result of the influence of the Gregorian Reform. This style is illustrated in such excellent works as the mural paintings from Sant Quirze de Pedret, Santa Maria d'Àneu and Sant Pere del Burgal.

Gothic Art Collection

The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya Gothic art collection began to take shape in the early decades of the 19th century, when a movement was first launched to revive and conserve the important body of Catalan heritage, which had been seriously damaged in the wave of convent burnings that took place at around the time of the disentailment of church goods in the year 1835.

The Gothic collection features a considerable number of Catalan works accompanied, moreover, by an extraordinary selection of pieces from the other territories that were once ruled by the Crown of Aragon. As a whole, this section presents a broad, representative panoramic view of Gothic art produced in the three large peninsular territories that formed part of the Crown – Catalonia, Aragon itself, and Valencia – as well as a more anecdotal selection of works from Mallorca.

The Gothic rooms display works from the late 13th, 14th and 15th centuries, arranged in chronological order, although the pieces are also grouped by school and typological affinity, and several thematic sections have been established. These include the renowned Mural paintings of the Conquest of Majorca, which preside over the first Gothic room. This same room also contains other works on profane themes or from secular sites, including elements from the enteixinats (coffered ceilings) of noble Barcelona houses to amatory caskets.

Other works in this and the following rooms, from Castile, Navarre, Aragon and Catalonia, clearly illustrate the predominance of French Gothic models, which endured until the mid-14th century, when competition was finally offered by new Italianate models. This new style, developed in the Italy of Giotto, was adopted and adapted here, working a profound transformation in painting and sculpture not only in Catalonia, but throughout the reigns forming part of the Crown of Aragon.

Besides a few Italian examples, the Museu Nacional also features an important selection of Italian, Catalan and Aragonese painting, such as the Triptych of Sant Vicenç d'Estopanyà, probably by an immigrant Italian artist, and altarpieces by the Serra brothers (the Serra family were highly influential in steering the course of Catalan painting during the closing decades of the 14th century). Sculpture during this period from the mid-14th century, was also influenced by Italian models, although the French Gothic style continued to exercise its authority. The collection includes works that may be attributed to some of the most outstanding sculptors of the time, such as Jaume Cascalls (see Head of Christ) and Bartomeu de Robió. Catalan sculpture in the late 14th century and the first half of the 15th is represented by two misericords from Barcelona Cathedral carved stalls by Pere Sanglada. From the 15th century, working in the new International Gothic style, Pere Oller and Pere Joan perhaps represent the peak of what was without doubt an important Catalan contribution to sculptural art.

Renaissance and Baroque Art Collection

The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya Renaissance and baroque art collection comprises pieces of priceless cultural heritage that – unlike the collections at other great national museums in Europe, which were generally built up from royal and aristocratic collections – was established in Catalonia through the acquisition of local pieces and later complemented by donations and acquisitions from private galleries.

The itinerary begins with art from the Low Countries in the 16th century, in which religious fervour is mixed with detailed depiction of everyday life, as can be seen in the superb collection of panels and triptychs commissioned for private use. In Catalonia during the early Renaissance period, the Gothic forms are found alongside other, new stylistic solutions, as exemplified, for instance, in St Candidus, by Ayne Bru or St Blaise, by Pere Fernández, works imbued with the humanist feeling and influenced by the modern composition theories that were then emerging in Italy. In the Altarpiece of St Eligius of the Silversmiths, Pere Nunyes clearly shows the influence of this new language, as does the sculptor Damià Forment in his interpretation of the Apostles for the Dormition of the Virgin. Towards the end of the 16th century, Spanish painting produced many works of outstanding beauty, such as El Greco's The Bearing of the Cross and St Peter and St Paul, enriched by modern use of colour, the fruit of the lessons the artist had learned in Venice. In this age, the Ecce Homo, Luis de Morales, a contemporary of El Greco, Jacopo Tintoretto or The Bassano, masterfully conveyed the devotional spirit of the Counter-Reformation.

The 17th century begins with the frescoes in the Herrera Chapel by Annibale Carracci and collaborators, who decorated the Church of San Giacomo degli Spagnuoli in Rome, and continues with works by other Italian artists such as the Neapolitans Massimo Stanzione and Andrea Vaccaro. However, standing out above all these are the masterpieces from the masters of the Spanish Golden Age, such as the Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew by José de Ribera, known as Lo Spagnoletto, St Paul, by Diego Velázquez, and the Immaculate Conception and several still lifes by Francisco de Zurbarán. Returning to Catalonia, in his image of St Cajetan, the sculptor Andreu Sala reveals himself to be a worthy follower of the Italian genius Bernini.

Entering now the 18th century, Antoni Viladomat's series of canvases devoted to the Life of St Francis, which decorated the main cloister of the former monastery of the Friars Minor in Barcelona, constitutes the only complete set of scenes from monastic life preserved in a museum. Finally, heralding the art forms that would develop in the 19th century, the daring works of Francesc Pla, known as El Vigatà, illustrate the painterly freedom taken when decorating the interiors of seigniorial mansions belonging to the new, wealthy classes who had made their fortunes in trade and industry.

Modern Art Collection

The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya modern art collection owes its origins to the 1888 Universal Exhibition, when Barcelona City Council installed what was then a modest collection of contemporary (for the time) modern art in the Palau de Belles Arts. This original core of the collection was considerably expanded by acquisitions made by the Council at art exhibitions. As it stands at present, the modern art collection contains a selection of the finest Catalan art from the early 19th century until the 1940s.

The first part of this itinerary is devoted to the neoclassical, Romantic and realist movements. Among the most outstanding Catalan neoclassical artists represented here are the painter Josep Bernat Flaugier and the sculptor Damià Campeny. In terms of Romanticism, particular mention should be made of Nazarene painters such as Claudi Lorenzale, who focussed on the portrait most notably, and Lluís Rigalt, a precursor of the Catalan landscape tradition, which was continued (now entering the Realist period) by Ramon Martí Alsina, who introduced Courbet's ideas in Catalonia, and Joaquim Vayreda, founder of the Olot School, among others. Special mention should also be made of Marià Fortuny, Catalonia's finest 19th-century painter. Fortuny's genre painting won him international acclaim, although towards the end of his short life he became interested in pictorial innovation, as can be seen in his last works. Also represented here are several painters who worked in the style of anecdotal realism, including Romà Ribera and Francesc Masriera, and the Luminists of the Sitges School, disciples of Fortuny. Turning now to sculpture, the Vallmitjana brothers are the most outstanding exponents of the realist tradition. Finally, the section devoted to the 19th century also includes examples from early photographic art, featuring works by A. A. Disdéri, Jean Laurent, Le Jeune and Charles Clifford, among others, featuring images of different places from all over Spanish territory.

Modernisme is a movement of enormous artistic and cultural importance in Catalonia, is one of the central themes in the Museu Nacional modern art collection. In painting, the works most clearly identified with this movement, infused with a spirit of renewal, are those by Ramon Casas and Santiago Rusiñol, whose Parisian paintings embrace certain elements from French Impressionism. Another important trend is Symbolism, represented here by the paintings of Alexandre de Riquer and Joan Brull, and also seen in certain photographs by the pictorialist Pere Casas Abarca. The second generation of Modernista artists are present in depth and number, too, with works by the likes of Isidre Nonell, Marià Pidelaserra, Ricard Canals, Hermen Anglada–Camarasa, Nicolau Raurich and Joaquim Mir, among others. It was these and other artists who helped to elevate Catalan painting to reach one of its most brilliant periods around the turn of the 20th century. The collection also includes works by Spanish painters, such as Julio Romero de Torres, Joaquim Sorolla, Ignacio Zuloaga, Darío de Regoyos and José Gutiérrez Solana, the photographer Ortiz-Echagüe and the French artists Boudin, Sisley and Rodin. Particularly interesting in the section devoted to Modernista sculpture are the works of Miquel Blay and Josep Llimona, who were clearly influenced by Rodin. The collection of Modernista decorative arts includes some exceptional examples of interior decorative art by Josep Puig i Cadafalch, Gaspar Homar and Antoni Gaudí from, respectively, the Amatller, Lleó Morera and Batlló houses in Barcelona's Passeig de Gràcia; objets d'art in various specialities, such as ironwork, ceramics, glasswork and jewellery; not forgetting several items of furniture by Joan Busquets and the architect Josep Maria Jujol.

The building

The National Palau of Montjuïc, known as Palau Nacional was constructed between 1926 and 1929, with the goal of being the main building of the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition, holding an Exhibition of Spanish Art named El Arte en España (The Art of Spain). More than 5,000 works came to the Exhibition from across Spain.

The Palau Nacional is a huge building (over 50,000 square metres (540,000 ft2)) which embodies the academic classical style that predominated in constructions for all the universal exhibitions of the period. Its façade is crowned by a great dome inspired by St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican City in Rome, flanked by two smaller domes, while four towers modelled on Santiago de Compostela Cathedral stand at the corners of the so-called Sala Oval, or Oval Hall. This great space (2,300 m2), used as the venue for important civic and cultural events, is encircled by tiered seating, preceded by double columns; it also houses a monumental organ, one of the biggest in Europe, waiting for an important restoration work. Many of the most outstanding painters and sculptors of the day, for the most part followers of the Noucentista aesthetic and cultural movement, were commissioned to decorate the interior of the Palau. Entrance from the front is by a huge staircase leading up from Avinguda de la Reina Maria Cristina, flanked halfway by magnificent monumental illuminated fountains designed by Carles Buïgas.

The first projects to develop the slopes of Montjuïc, turning the mountain into the city's green lung and a leisure activity centre for the people of Barcelona, date back to the early 20th century. However, these ideas were given decisive momentum when Montjuïc was chosen as the site for the great International Exhibition organised by the city in 1929. The renowned Modernisme architect Josep Puig i Cadafalch was commissioned to direct the urban development and architectural aspects of this project, and Juan Claude Nicolas Forestier and Nicolau Maria Rubió i Tudurí landscaped the gardens. Under these plans, the Palau Nacional was to be the central palace for the exhibition. In 1923, the dictator Primo de Rivera seized power, with the result that Puig i Cadafalch was removed from the project. A competition to design and build the Palau Nacional was then won by the architects Eugenio P. Cendoya, Enric Catà and Pere Domènech i Roura. The palace was to provide the central venue for a great exhibition entitled Art in Spain and featuring original works and reproductions representing the history of Spanish art, complemented by two extensions: the Poble Espanyol (Spanish Village) architectural site, still open today, and the Palau d'Art Modern (Palace of Modern Art), which was later demolished.

Library and archive

The library is the most important documentation centre open to the public. Its origins go back to the books referred to by museum technicians in Barcelona when preparing for the 1888 Universal Exhibition. In the early 20th century, the Junta de Museus de Catalunya (Catalan Museums Board) decided that the library should be opened to the public, and decisive impetus was given to this initiative when the Special Committee for the library was set up in 1907. From that year onwards, the library holdings were constantly enriched by legacies and donations from important private libraries.

The Museu Nacional Library collections comprise domestic and foreign books and magazines on different aspects of art: monographic works on art and artists; photography; numismatics; local history; a reserve section containing a collection of manuscripts; incunabula such as the 1493 Nuremberg Chronicle; works published pre 1900; and the books of artists and collector's editions. Sections of particular interest include that devoted to exhibition catalogues, established in 1913 and containing printed matter on shows held at galleries in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain and even further afield, and 'The Press', established in 1968, which brings together news items published in the daily media and of interest to the artworld.

It is thanks to the Museu Nacional publications policy, that many of these works were acquired – it aims to promote exchanges and so provide the library with copies of works published by museums and art centres all over the world.

The library facilities are designed to provide Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya technical staff, researchers, students, art professionals and all individuals interested in the art world with all the information they seek. The reading room provides access to the library catalogue, the Collective Catalogue of Universities (CCUC), several databases (Princeton University, Index of Christian Art; Bibliography of the History of Art; Art Price), and to databases available on CD-ROM and Internet.

Another important element in the Museu Nacional organisational structure is the archive, founded as a department in 1995 to standardise management of the museum's documentary collections. With regard to the origin of these collections, the archive contains both documentation generated by the museum since 1991, when the consortium was set up, and historic documents from institutions that now form part of the Museu Nacional: the Museu d'Art de Catalunya (Art Museum of Catalonia), the Museu d'Art Modern (Museum of Modern Art), the Cabinet of Drawings and Prints, the Numismatic Cabinet of Catalonia, and the Library of Art History.

Network of art museums

The Museu Nacional, as a museological institution of reference in the country, promotes a network that joins together the art museums in a common collaboration strategy, for placing value and spreading Catalan artistic heritage. The network of art museums was created with the aim of developing services, projects and activities jointly, so as to achieve a greater social, touristic and scientific projection among all the member museums. The following museums currently form part:

Biblioteca-Museu Víctor Balaguer, de Vilanova i la Geltrú; el Museu d'Art de Girona; el Museu Episcopal de Vic; Museu Diocesà i Comarcal de Solsona; el Museu del Cau Ferrat, de Sitges; el Museu de la Garrotxa, d'Olot; el Museu d'Art Jaume Morera, de Lleida; el Museu de Lleida Diocesà i Comarcal; el Museu de l'Empordà, de Figueres; el Museu de Reus; el Museu de Valls; el Museu de Manresa; el Museu d'Art de Sabadell; el Museu Abelló, de Mollet del Vallès; el Museu d'Art Modern de Tarragona; el Museu d'Art de Cerdanyola; la Fundació Apel·les Fenosa, del Vendrell; el Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona; el Museu del Disseny de Barcelona; el Museu Frederic Marès, de Barcelona i la Fundació Palau, de Caldes d'Estrac.

Educational activities

One of the other aspects of the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya is the number of services and training proposals and entertainment for families and schools. The museum has an educational service itself, which offers several resources for learning and services tailored to different audiences. Among others, a program is the museum common space of integration aimed at people at risk of exclusion and use the museum as a key integrator and software Museum hosts, aimed at integrating with other training projects related to art.

Another of the best known proposals is Museum as an integration space (El Museu espai comú d'integració, in Catalan), and also A hand of stories (Una Ma de Contes), a joint initiative between Televisió de Catalunya and Museu Nacional, which explains 20 short stories representing 20 paintings of Museu Nacional permanent collection, with a different look.

There are also activities which are encouraged in the relationship between children and artists active. They participated in activities such contemporary artists as Philip Stanton Gino Rubert or Lluïsa Jover.

Restoration and Preventive Conservation Centre

The aim of the Department of the Restoration and Preventive Conservation is to ensure the conservation of all the works in the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya collections. The department helps to guarantee the physical conservation of all the museum's holdings, including both works on exhibition and in storage, on deposit or on loan, whilst also seeking to delay as far as possible the ageing process that affects the materials that form the artworks. In addition, the Restoration and Preventive Conservation Department also studies the materials and the technical aspects of works with a view to providing scientific and technical assistance for art historians specialising in different periods, promoting dialogue and interdisciplinary studies.

At the centre, professionals from different specialist disciplines study problems affecting the works, or changes they are undergoing, determining the causes of deterioration and doing their utmost to eliminate any risk to the works. In this regard, a key aim is to create a stable environment and to establish the best conditions for exhibiting, storing, handling, packing and transporting works. The centre seeks to minimise deterioration to the collections by ensuring that the most appropriate environmental conditions and exhibition systems are provided, as well as exercising strict control over the movement of objects and the restoration treatments applied to individual works.

Most of the activity at the centre is concerned with prevention, but due importance is also attached to reparative treatment and restoration. Restoration work is aimed at improving the aesthetic reading of pieces on which, very often, restorers from much earlier generations have previously intervened, working according to criteria very different from those applied today. Needless to say, restoration is not carried out in the hope of returning works to their original state; but rather, to take into account the passing of time and any work that has already been carried out on the piece, and which now forms part of the history of restoration in Catalonia in general.

The center exists due to the impulse that Joaquim Folch i Torres gave to the project when he sent Manuel Grau i Mas in Milan with the objective that was formed by the hand of Mauro Pelliccioli, then director of the restoration laboratories in Milan, attached to the Pinacoteca di Brera art gallery. The Milan laboratories had a decisive influence on how restoration work was carried out all over Europe. Work continues today with a view to establishing the Museu Nacional Department of Restoration and Preventive Conservation as a reference and resource, which may operate separately from the museum itself, in terms both of the working methodologies and the rigour and the criteria that the centre applies.

The Board of Trustees

The Board of Trustees governs the museum. As well as representatives from the consortium members, administration, and the management, it is made up of representatives of people who contribute to the achievement of its goals. As of December 2024 the president is Joan Oliveras i Bagués and vice-presidents are Sònia Hernández Almodóvar, Maria Eugènia Gay Rosell, and Jordi Martí Grau.

Members of the board (2024) comprise:

Directors

List of Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya directors since its foundation

1934–1939: Joaquim M. Folch i Torres

1939–1948: Xavier de Salas

1948–1985: Joan Ainaud de Lasarte

1985–1985: Lluís Domènech

1985–1991: Joan Sureda

1991–1994: Xavier Barral

1994–2005: Eduard Carbonell

2006–2011: Maite Ocaña

2012–today: Pepe Serra

In popular culture

The Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya is a featured locale in the 2009 video game Wheelman, published by Midway Games.

This place was also the 11th pitstop of the four-time Emmy Award winning reality show The Amazing Race 10.