Spain’s Premier Private Art Collection Unveiled

Palacio Cibeles in Madrid, home to CentroCentro art space Photo via: Siente Madrid

Entrepreneur Juan Abelló and his wife Ana Gamazo, the owners of one of the most significant art collections in Spain, are making 160 highlights from their collection available for public viewing for the first time, ABC reports. The exhibition, which is curated by former Museo del Prado director Felipe Garín, opens at the CentroCentro art space in Madrid today.

The Abelló collection is focused on masters from the 15th to the 20th Centuries. It features a museum-quality selection of works by the likes of Lucas Cranach the Elder, El Greco, Francisco de Zurbarán, Francisco de Goya, Joaquín Sorolla, Pablo Picasso, Juan Gris, Salavador Dalí, Vincent van Gogh, Gustav Klimt, Edgar Degas, Henri Matisse, Constantin Brâncuși, Balthus, and Francis Bacon among others.

Known for their privacy, the couple had never accepted any offers to show their collection in public before, although several important works had previously been loaned to the Museo del Prado and the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid, and to the Meadows Museum in Dallas.

Amassed slowly and thoughtfully over four decades, the star-studded collection has never sat in storage facilities, though. Most of the 500 works that form the Abelló collection are usually displayed at their Madrid residence, office, and various country houses, according to ABC.


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