Artistic Barcelona

Gaudí & Modernisme ★★★ - Catalonia's particularly fluid and idiosyncratic version of the Art Nouveau revolution was called Modernisme, and its high priest was Antoni Gaudí (1852–1926). Gaudí incorporated creative wrought-iron patterns and colorful mosaics into his flowing, organic structures, from residential buldings (dragon-backed Casa Batlló ★★★; the undulating La Pedrera ★★) to a marvelous city park (Park Güell ★) to the amazing sand-castle basilica of Sagrada Familia ★★★, which you can watch still being built... » more

Museu Picasso ★★ - The greatest Picasso museum outside of Paris is filled with 3,000 works by Andalusia native Pablo Picasso (1881–1973). There are plenty of those crowd-pleasing (or crowd-confusing) Cubist paintings, yes, but also many early works in an exactingly, surprisingly classical style worthy of an Old Master... but which Picasso painted while living here in Barcelona when he was still just a teenager... » more

Fundació Joan Miró ★ - The world's greatest collection of art by Barcelona native Joan Miró (1893–1983) inhabits this modernist building on Montjuïc hill. The foundation owns a staggering 14,000 works by the modern master of colorful whimsical, often delightfully playful art alongside works by Miró contemporaries (Duchamp, Ernst, Calder, Léger, Moore, Oldenburg, etc.)... » more

Fundació Antoni Tàpies - The grand Barcelona painter and artist Antoni Tàpies i Puig (1923–2012) created this foundation—in an early Modernisme structure by Lluís Domènech i Montaner—to serve as a space for contemporary art exhibitons and lectures, and to preserve his own artistic legacy, housing more than 2,000 of his works... » more