Palau Nacional, Parc de Montjuic
Metro: Espanya (L1, L3)
Tel: 93 622 0375
Hrs: Tue-Sat/ Mar-Sab, 10:00-19:00; Sun/ Dom, 10:00-14:30
Cl/ Cierre: Mon/ Lun
Admission: 6€, students/ estudiantes 4.20€, under 7 free/ menor de 7 años gratuito

Housed in the fabulous Palau Nacional of Montjuic, the huge, multi-towered building with spectacular views over Barcelona, this museum exhibits the whole range of Catalan art and sculpture from the Romanesque period to the 20th century - from the 11th century to the 1940s. It provides the visitor with an extraordinary insight into the development of Catalonia's finest artists over the centuries, and includes the most important collection of Romanesque art in the world.
Since the 1920s, the museum authorities have engaged in a programme to stop foreign collectors from buying priceless Romanesque wall paintings and carvings which had been stripped from churches and sold by greedy mayors and community leaders over a long period; and also to prevent some from decaying through neglect. To preserve them for Catalonia, the paintings, some of them only remnants of the originals, have been officially stripped from churches, restored and then blended into the interior walls of the museum, as if they had always belonged there. They have even created exact replicas of church structures inside to remind the visitor of the provenance of the wall paintings. The unique effect is stunning.
There is also now a full display, for the first time, of the Cambo collection, a bequest from a wealthy patron of the arts who left a treasure-trove of European paintings from the 14th century to the beginning of the 19th century, including works by Titian, Tiepolo and Rubens. The museum also displays a wonderful selection of paintings, sculpture, photography, coins, medals, drawings and prints.