Picasso museums

I haven’t been to Malaga, but my recollection is that the Picasso Museum in Barcelona focuses mainly on his early works. Maybe that snippet of information will help you decide.

In Barcelona we were more impressed by the city history museum and the Jewish museum than the Picasso museum. And we do love Picasso.

https://www.barcelona.cat/museuhistoria/en/heritages/els-espais-del-muhba/muhba-placa-de-rei

https://www.barcelona.cat/museuhistoria/ca/patrimonis/els-espais-del-muhba/muhba-el-call

I'd seen a lot of Picassos and several Picasso specific museums before visiting Barcelona's museum. I enjoyed seeing Barcelona's collection of his his early works. I would agree with Laurie Ann above that there was a concentration of these. I appreciated that as I have seen many of his "mature" or later works. However, as noted above, that may not be every viewer's interest which is absolutely fine. We aren't required to have the same perspectives on a collection (no pun intended).

Sorry I can't compare to Malaga for you!

I've been to both, and I think a key difference is that the Barcelona museum gets a lot more visitors, to the point that people can be standing elbow-to-elbow. It can be difficult to get close enough to the wall to read the labels beside the paintings. I saw the Barcelona museum in August 2016 and the Malaga Museum in April 2019, so the month of the year may have been a factor.

I'd consider other sightseeing plans you have in each city and the time available. Barcelona is difficult for short-term visitors since so many sights need to be pre-booked for specific times.

Thank you everyone I appreciate all your helpful responses!

Yes, in Spanish museums you will see mostly early Picasso, since he moved to France as a young man, never returned to Franco’s Spain, and few of his works after the 1920s would have had any reason to go to Spain. The big exception is of course the famous Guernica in Madrid, which also was painted outside Spain, spent decades in New York and came to Spain in the 1980s after Franco’s death. The early works are well worth seeing but not what a lot of people tend to think of when they think of Picasso.

Just one more data point. My experience in March 2024 at Barcelona’s Picasso Museum was not at all as Acraven describes her crowded situation. I would say that for me, the museum was “comfortably busy”, but I had no difficulties getting close to paintings or ceramics or reading the signs. I have been in much denser crowds/groups when attending “Members only” viewings at my local Chicago Art Institute.

Just shows how different visitors’ experiences and impressions of a place can be depending on the day and the hour!

I used the audioguide which was minimal, but I thought a good addition. Staff was quite helpful.

Just for info: the Picasso Museum (well, ALL museums here in Barcelona) has a legal max capacity -which is far from elbow-to-elbow- beyond which no more people are allowed in. Yet different people might have different perceptions of what "elbow-to-elbow" is.

Furthermore, the Picasso Museum website has a useful gadget that shows the occupation rate for a particular date/hour, which hints at how busy it will be. But again, that shows how busy will it be "as of today", the day of the purchase, but of course, from today to the date in question, occupancy can increase. This gadget can be seen on the screen in which you need to enter the time slot for the tickets.

Enric, they may have changed the regulations or tightened enforcement since 2016. It absolutely was elbow-to-elbow, except in the ceramics room, which no one but me seemed to care about. It was as bad as the worst photos I've seen of the Vatican Museums, as were at least some areas of Casa Batllo (though not as packed as the museum); Casa Mila was a bit better than Casa Batllo. Given those venues do not clear their exhibition halls on a timed schedule--true of most sights except the Villa Borghese in Rome--and visitors can stay as long as they want, maintaining a maximum capacity that doesn't offend the local fire marshal really depends on the door minder who I imagine is intended (later in the day) to let X new people in only as X earlier arrivals leave.

I'm glad to hear others haven't had the same experience I did. My visit was as a member of the Picasso Tour offered by the Tourist Office. The tour began in the afternoon, I'd guess at 3 PM, and we probably hit the museum around 4.