Madrid’s Royal Collections Museum Opens with Treasures of Spanish Royalty

The museum is located in a new building found in the gardens of the Campo del Moro park in the center of the city. It is a neighbor to the Almundena Cathedral and the Royal Palace. The building is designed by the winners of the ideas contest, Emilio Tuñón and Luis Moreno Mansilla (Mansilla + Tuñón). They began construction in 2006 but the project quickly was halted after discovering archaeological remains in the construction zone, then again it was paused while awaiting funds to complete the interior, and then, yet again, due to the pandemic. Overall this has been a long process for Patrimonio Nacional, its chairwoman, Ana de la Cueva, and the museum’s director, Leticia Ruiz, but all their hard work is finally coming to fruition. On the subject, de la Cueva said in a quote to CNN that it has become “a modern building with sober lines, spectacular in dimension. The combination of classic art and the Baroque against these lines is very powerful.

The entire project cost a whopping €172 million ($186.8 million), but the Spanish government justifies the cost because of the implementation of the museum’s “new and necessary model for the Spanish museum scene, both in its concept and in its formulation and content,” according to the Patrimonio Nacional’s website. The museum is different from all others in Spain because it will deal with aspects of global collecting by the Spanish monarchy that have not been shown ever before.  

The Royal Collections Museum has been meticulously curated to encapsulate centuries of Spain's regal history. Renowned for their artistic patronage, the Spanish royal family has amassed an extraordinary collection of paintings, sculptures, tapestries, and decorative arts, which will now be accessible to the public for the first time in the museum's impressive galleries. It will be organized in chronological order, like a historical narrative that runs through nearly fifteen centuries of Spanish royalty.

The museum’s permanent collection will hold approximately 800 pieces selected from over 160,000 cultural assets that are inventoried in the collections of Patrimonio Nacional, Royal Libraries of the Royal Palace, Monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, and the General Archive of the Palace. Some highlights of this collection include masterworks by Spanish classics such as Velazquez and Goya, as well as rarely-seen artworks by little-known female artists. 

One such work is a 1692 wooden sculpture by Luisa Roldan, the first woman appointed as a Spanish court sculptor. On Roldan, Luisa Ruiz, director of the museum said to CNN, “The fundamental thing about Roldan was her quality, which allowed her to escape anonymity and become head of the workshop, ranked higher than her husband. It’s likely that there were many other women in family (artist) workshops. But who remained anonymous.” 

While all these new and never before seen works will be united together in this mecca of Spanish art, there are groups that raise concerns about the moving of objects from smaller cities to the capital. For example, several pieces in the new museum were taken from the monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, located an hour outside of Madrid. The monastery is a hopping tourist attraction but it depended on these pieces to attract visitors. Without them, their future is unclear.

Perhaps the new Royal Collections Museum will inspire tourists in Madrid to visit these smaller destinations, or maybe the Museum can work with these institutions to hold joint exhibitions or loans. We will just have to wait to see how the opening goes, and what happens next for these incredible works.