Art & Design Trips to Barcelona

The Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art is situated in the Placa dels Angel’s area. In 1959, art critic Alexandre Cirici Pellicer formed a group of contemporary artists showing work in a series of 23 exhibitions, with the hopes of beginning a collection for a new contemporary art museum in Barcelona.

In 1986, the Barcelona City Council recommended the American architect Richard Meier Partners to design the museum. The permanent collection of around 5,000 works dates from the mid-20 th century onward. The three periods of modern art represented are the forties to the sixties, the sixties and seventies and the last are contemporary. The collections focus on post 1945 Catalan and Spanish art, and the museum also stages seasonal exhibitions, which can be viewed on the museums website.

This is a great experience for students to observe contemporary artwork in a beautiful building with stunning views from Barcelona through the glass panels.

The museum of National Art of Catalunya is located in the Palau Nacional; the MNAC contains the world’s most important collection of Romanesque art as well as the gothic art section and the Cambo collection. The collections date from the 10th and 20th century offering a complete exhibition encompassing all art disciplines (sculpture, painting, drawing, engraving, posters as well as photography and coin collections).

The museum aims to give a vision of art in Catalonia throughout history. The collection features works by artists such as El Greco, Zurbaran, Velazquez, Fortuny, Gaudi, Casas, Torres-Garcia, Dali, Julio Gonzalez and Picasso. The museum has plenty to offer students with beautiful collections offering great insight into ancient collections.

The Picasso museum is located in the quarter El Born and was founded after Jaime Sabates, the former secretary and friend of Picasso, devoted a large collection of works to the city. For this purpose the Palacio de Berenguer d’Aguilar, an old city palace from the 15th century, was converted into a museum to house the collection.

The Picasso Museum in Barcelona reveals the genius of the young artist through more than 3,500 works that make up the permanent collection. The museum also reveals his relationship with Barcelona an intimate, solid relationship that was shaped in his adolescence and youth, continuing even after his death. This is a fantastic opportunity to see Picasso’s younger works of art and his early influences.

The Dali Theatre and Museum is a museum of the artist Salvador Dali in his hometown of Figueres, in Catalonia, Spain. Salvador Dali is buried there in a crypt below the stage. The man himself said ‘I want my museum to be a single block, a labyrinth, a great surrealist object. It will be a totally theatrical museum. The people who come to see it will leave with the sensation of having had a theatrical dream.’

The heart of the museum is the building that housed the town’s theatre when Dali was a child. The museum displays the single largest and most diverse collection of works by Salvador Dali, the core of which is the artist’s personal collection. It contains the broadest range of works spanning the artistic career from 1980-1989. In addition to Dali paintings from all decades of his career, there is Dali sculptures, 3-dimensional collages, mechanical devices and other curiosities from Dali’s imagination.

Figueres is situated around 75 miles from Barcelona.

The Fundacio Joan Miro Foundation, founded in 1975 by Joan Miro himself, is located in the museum on the mountain Montjuic. The wide variety of techniques he used in his career are widely represented by the more than 14,000 exhibits on display. 217 paintings, 179 sculptures, a variety of prints and textiles and over 8,000 drawings, which provide an in-depth understanding of the creative process of the Catalan genius. In addition to the works by Joan Miro, the foundation also has a small collection of contemporary art consisting of gifts and loans from leading artists.

Mis van der Rohe built the German pavilion for the World Exhibition 1929. Following the exhibition the pavilion was deconstructed in 1930, and after various initiatives rebuilt at its original place between 1983 and 1986. The rebuild is a striking demonstrator of rationalist architecture and The Bauhaus style can clearly be recognised in the pavilion.

The innovative architectural structure of the rebuild represented a radical change in the layout of space, and has had great influence on the development of modern architecture. The pavilion houses the Barcelona Chair which Mies van der Rohe created exclusively for the space.

CaixaForum is housed in a former textile mill built in 1911 and designed by the modernist architect Puig I Cadafalch. It now hosts a wide variety of interesting cultural activities, exhibitions, and displays an exhibition of works from the Foundation contemporary art collection.

The last apartment house built by Antoni Gaudi, the Casa-Mila (or “stone quarry” as it is affectionately known) is considered the epitome of Modernism with its impressive façade of undulating stone and iron balconies. Groups of more than 15 should book in advance. Guided tours are available in English and Spanish. There is an accompanying exhibition, Espai Gaudi.

The Gaudi museum offers great opportunities to learn more about the life and work of visionary Catalan architect, Antoni Gaudi. The house was designed by Gaudi’s colleague Francese Berenguer, Gaudi did have a hand in designing the garden pergala and the beautiful furniture.

The museum preserves the memory of Gaudi’s revolutionary techniques through fine examples of furniture and other objects he designed. It also gives great insight into the craft production system of Catalonia during the Art Nouveau period giving an idea of how Gaudi worked. The Gaudi Museum is a great opportunity for students to see contemporary art in its home, giving them the chance to explore the house where Gaudi spent the last days of his life, from 1906 to 1925

Bookings are not required. Student groups cannot enter between 14h00 and 16h00.

The Museu del Disseny de Barcelona is an important museum in Barcelona dedicated to design, fashion and decorative arts. It is housed in the Edifici Disseny HUB a new iconic building designed by MBM architects.

The Museu del Disseny collections were previously conserved in four different museums: Museum of Tissues and Dresses, Museum of Ceramics, Decorative Arts Museum and the Gallery of Graphic Arts. The permanent exhibition of the museum is divided into four thematic sections, each being located on a different floor level: industrial design, decorative arts, fashion and graphic design. These exhibitions feature a large number of rare and interesting objects dating from 3 rd century to present day, as well as documents, videos and interactive exhibits that help to contextualise the exposed artefacts.

The collection ranges from 12th century Arabic pieces and traces the history of glazed Spanish ceramics until the end of the 19th century through to contemporary pieces by Artigas, Cumella, Miro, Picasso and others. The museum also holds a range of temporary exhibitions, special events and conferences.

This new exhibition enables students to delve into Gaudi’s creative universe. The Gaudi experiences allows students to take an interactive and 4D journey of the Modernist Architecture at the G Experiència and discover what lies behind Antoni Gaudi’s innovative architectural language.

This new cultural tourist attraction offers a different and unique way to know Gaudi and his numerous works through state of the art audio-visual technology. There is a 4D-seated presentation of his life with surround sound, stereoscopic vision and moving seats with special effects. This is the first centre dedicated solely to presenting Gaudi’s life and works.