Kirsty Mckenzie
A GERMAN art collector and dealer has gifted a state of the art museum to Cáceres.
The recently remodelled building was made to house Helga de Alvear’s unique collection of contemporary art, which she has also donated to the city.
The collection boasts work from more than 500 artists including Joseph Beuys, Dan Flavin, Jenny Holzer Joseph Albers, Paul Klee and Nan Goldin.
Around 200 pieces, collected by Alverar over four decades, will be unveiled to the public when the museum opens its doors this Spring.
The museum will be free to the public.
De Alvearsaid in a statement: “I am interested in contemporary art because it tells us about our time and about ourselves, because it creates and develops a language that can explain, in a new way, the world in which we live and from which we often empty ourselves.”
A smaller version of the Museum and the Alvear Foundation has been in operation on the same site since 2010. The museum’s first site, a villa from 1913, still stands, but is now built by a very modern building with a white facade, which was designed by Tuñón Arquitectos.
The construction of the site began in 2015 at a cost of 10 million euros, which was distributed between de Alvear and the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Sports of the Junta de Extremadura.
The architect Tuñón explained that ‘both buildings are similar and differ in size and shape’
He added: “They are complementary in size and different in structure and shape. But together they form the new image of Cáceres.”
