November 2012 - Barcelona

ART
in BCN
They’re not in the Prado, the Louvre or the MoMA:
they’re masterpieces of world art and they’re right here
in Barcelona. Joana Hurtado and Ricard Mas have
picked ten works that no visitor to the city should miss.
Photos Iván Moreno
Who leaves Paris without paying a
visit on the Mona Lisa? And yet
plenty of people pass through
Barcelona without seeing the great
Pantocrator of Taüll. The city may
not have anything on the scale of the
Louvre, but its many museums and
foundations contain works that bear
comparison with the best in the
world, and attract visitors from all
over the world.
The MNAC has one of the finest
collections of Romanesque art
anywhere, centring on spectacular
mural paintings dating from the 11th
to the 13th centuries. The murals
were removed whole from churches
around Catalonia between 1919 and
1923, to save them from damage or
looting, and carefully reconstructed
in the museum. The MNAC’s
stunning Gothic and Modernista
galleries, representing two of the
region’s richest and most interesting
artistic periods, are no less
impressive. If the MNAC’s Gothic
galleries leaves you wanting more,
the Fundació Godia’s small but
remarkable medieval collection
comes highly recommended.
To bring the story up to date, the
Museu d’Art Contemporani de
Barcelona (MACBA) specialises in
Spanish and Catalan art created since
1945. There’s also Can Framis, a
brand new museum given over to the
Vila Casas Foundation’s collection of
contemporary art. In combination,
these provide a general overview of
Catalan art from its roots right up to
the present day.
For anyone who wants a fuller
appreciation of 20th-century art, four
of the greatest artists of the period –
Picasso, Joan Miró, Antoni Tàpies
and Joan Brossa – have strong
connections to Barcelona, and each is
represented by significant collections
in the museums and foundations that
bear their names.
So as not to overwhelm you, we’ve
narrowed down this ample field to ten
of the best, focusing on painting and
sculpture on display in permanent
collections. Barcelona’s museums
concentrate on Catalan art, and this
selection reflects that tendency. These
are the most representative works of
artists who have left their mark on the
region’s culture.
8 Time Out BCN Guide November 2012