Thyssen Bornemisza Museum

The Great Private Collection Showcasing European Painting from the 13th to the 20th Century

The story of the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum begins like a true art-world thriller. In the late 1980s, Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza was searching for a new home for his private collection, one of the largest and most valuable collections of European art in the world. Since 1936, much of it had been housed at the family’s Villa Favorita in Lugano. However, the Baron wished to bring together in a single museum all the masterpieces acquired by his family over several generations, which until then had been scattered across different countries.

The Baron’s ambitious plan to expand his Swiss residence ultimately failed when the authorities refused to subsidise the substantial construction costs. This marked the beginning of a genuine competition between Europe’s leading capitals. London and Paris entered the race—with invitations at the highest political level, including a famous afternoon tea with Margaret Thatcher—but, unexpectedly, Madrid emerged as a serious contender. The Spanish capital had one decisive advantage: Carmen Cervera, the Baron’s wife, who established close contacts with the government of Felipe González. The proposal was straightforward: the neoclassical Villahermosa Palace, opposite the Prado Museum, would become the permanent home of the collection.

Madrid ultimately prevailed over London and Paris, and since 1992 the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum has completed Madrid’s renowned “Golden Triangle of Art” along the Paseo del Prado. With around one thousand works, the collection offers an outstanding journey through the history of Western art: from the Florentine and Venetian masters and the German Renaissance, through Flemish landscape painting and French Impressionism, to German Expressionism and Russian Constructivism. From Jan van Eyck to Francis Bacon, the Thyssen is the perfect complement to the Prado Museum’s collection.

A visit to discover one of Europe’s great private art collections and understand how Madrid established itself as one of the continent’s leading cultural capitals.