When our director Pepe Serra said goodbye to the team at the Museu Picasso he told us: ‘We have done ten years’ work in five years.’ What follows is a brief summary of some of the projects carried out during his time as director.
· Research and development of exhibitionsthat contribute knowledge and added value.
The putting together of “Picasso 1936. Traces of an Exhibition” was a very special challenge. There we were, an art museum, proposing a show containing no original work of any kind: in the words of the curator of this radical venture, Sílvia Domènech, it was a question of creatingan exhibition of documents rather than with documents, in order to conceptualize the significance of the Picasso Exhibition held in Barcelona, Madrid and Bilbao in 1936 through analysis of the archives.
Interview with Silvia Domenech, curator of the exhibition Read more »
We are pleased to share with you some excerpts from an article by Francesc Pujols, ‘The Rooftops of Barcelona’, first published in “La Publicidad” on 18 June 1920. Though written a few years after Picasso’s time in Barcelona, when he painted a number of pictures with the city’s rooftops as their theme, the writer seems to be describing some of the works in our collection. We are thankful to the poet Enric Casassess for sending us the article, which came to his mind as he was walking round the Museu Picasso.
Roofs of Barcelona. Pablo Picasso, 1903 Read more »
The task of choosing the most representative images of this year that is coming to an end was far from easy. Between us, we have worked on a lot of projects! Exhibitions, activities, research and restoration, education, registrar, library, publications, communications, administration, visitor services… it’s a long list. Here, then, is just a taste of what the museum has done in 2011.
From 17 November 2011 to 20 January 2012 the Tel Aviv Museum of Art is hosting the Picasso exhibition “Tauromachy. Works from the Collection of the Museu Picasso Barcelona”. The initiative has come about as part of the cooperation agreement between the Museu Picasso and Acción Cultural Española (AC/E), which chose to show Picasso for the first time in Israel, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two states.
The Palazzo Giulia Rosselmini Gualandi, a magnificent Renaissance mansion on the banks of the Arno, is home to the Fondazzione Palazzo Blu, and is hosting the exhibition “Ho voluto essere pittore e sono diventato Picasso” — I Wanted to Be a Painter and I Became Picasso. This is the first ever show of Picasso’s work in the city of Pisa and it runs from 14 October 2011 to 29 January 2012. The major retrospective brings together some two hundred works, including paintings, drawings, ceramics and etchings, and traces Picasso’s output from 1901 to 1970. The show has been organized and coordinated by the Giunti Arte Mostre e Musei cultural council, and was curated by Claudia Beltrami Ceppi.
Entrance to the exhibition with the Leaning Tower in the background Read more »
‘Can we see Picasso’s Mona Lisa?’ ‘Don’t you have any colour postcards of Guernica?’ Unlikely as they may seem, these are some of the odd questions and curious situations that confront the Museum staff from time to time. In its almost 50 years of existence the Museu Picasso has built up a rich stock of good stories — often funny, sometimes surprising and on occasion touching. Here are some of the anecdotes that have become abiding favourites among the Museum’s gallery staff.
The visit of Lluís-Anton Baulenas to the Reading Club signified a change of rhythm in the dynamic of our meetings: instead of talking amongst ourselves about the text of a deceased author, for the first time we were able to share the opinions and ideas with an author who is not only still alive, but who answered our questions and enthused us with his reflections about La felicitat (Happiness). Read more »
So you think there’s no one in the Museum on a Monday?
Far from it! Monday is one of our busiest days of the week: the offices are full of people and in the exhibition rooms they’re working flat out to get everything ready for the new week. Take a look!
For all of us at the Museum the greeting card for Christmas 2010 and this new year that has just begun had a star that was foreseeable but at the same time unexpected: a photograph of Pablo Picasso! The unexpected part is that this is an unpublished photograph, the very existence of which was previously unknown.