What was he going to do with so many works? In Madrid, he already had five warehouses After almost five years in the construction phase and a few months dedicated to the refurbishment of the four floors that make up the building, the great dream of the gallery owner Helga de Alvear is finally a reality she opens her new museum of contemporary art in Caceres after an investment of 10 million euros supported practically in half by the institutional support of the Junta de Extremadura.
Nestled in the heart of the monumental city, with an area of 5,000 m2 (8,000 with a garden and provision for storage), the first exhibition which will be inaugurated this Thursday by the Kings of Spain houses 200 works selected from the nearly 3,000 that the collector of German origin (Renania, 1936) since he settled in our country in 1957. Helga had married the Cordovan architect Jaime de Alvear, who died 10 years ago and art was not yet in his life. I wanted to be a pianist. I did know about music, not about art. But I met Juana Mordo, who taught me he confesses hours before the release.
All the pieces, accumulated over the years with care, already have a physical -and magical- space where they can be stored and exhibited together, a new building with wide ceilings that houses the most complete private collection of contemporary art that currently exists in Europe. . Cáceres won the game over other Spanish cities such as San Sebastián or Granada, with which Helga de Alvear also maintained preservations for its location, but offered renovations of old buildings -and not the construction of a new plant-, an option that the gallery owner scorned.
Art is a right and a necessity proclaims the collector, who has donated one million euros to support the investigation against covid-19 directed by virologist Luis Enjuanes for the CSIC. Now, with the opening of the new museum – with limited capacity from Friday it aims to bring the art of the present closer to society and future generations as an essential engine for building the future. For this reason, De Alvear cannot be overjoyed, I am very happy, delighted that it has finally been achieved, after 16 years exhibiting works from my collection all over the world, because now you have the possibility to see all the pieces together. I’m crazy lost. And he adds I hope Caceres and Spain can enjoy this Museum
BUILDING
To design the wrapping of the macro-collection, a public tender was called in 2005, which was won by the Madrid studio Tunon Arquitectos after proposing an ambitious design that contained the first phase of rehabilitation of the so-called Casa Grande, of 3,000 square meters, where until now it has exhibited the Helga de Alvear Foundation. Subsequently, construction of another 15,000 m2 was planned for this new building of the Museum of Contemporary Art, although later, due to budgetary problems, the surface was reduced to a third. The works planned for three years – began in 2015 and took six years. A part of the garden has yet to be completed and a warehouse and offices have been prepared. The building will have three entrances.
The idea was to join the old city of Caceres in a corridor, from Pizarro street to the widening that represents the access through Camino Llano street explains Emilio Tunon, responsible for the design together with Luis Moreno Mansilla, who died in 2012. The objective? Create simple volumes away from the bombast to bring the museum closer to the citizens, explains Tunon, who always thought of the traces of the city to also link it with the monumental history of Caceres. It is almost a castle, a fortress. Hence, a vertical collection of pilasters was introduced, romantically linked to another of the city’s great emblems, the Atrio restaurant another work by Tunon and Mansilla- with its firm colonnades. But always thinking of a discreet design as if in silence to welcome inside what is truly important which are the pieces.
INCLUDES GOYA
The new building houses a selection of works by artists such as Olafur Eliasson, Pablo Picasso, Louise Bourgeois, Wassily Kandinsky, Helena Almeida, and Ai Weiwei, among others. The curator and head of the museography are Jose Maria Vinuela, who assures that he has opted for this inaugural exhibition for large works in keeping with the building and that it includes a space dedicated to the avant-garde. Another room has also been designed for Francisco de Goya, through the first edition of his Caprichos, to disseminate his influence on modern and contemporary art.
In addition to the works in the collection, the Helga de Alvear Foundation will offer a tour of the pieces installed in different public spaces in the historic center of Caceres, a city with which the gallery owner has had a love story for two decades and that with this The museum will now become eternal, Having an art gallery is a very important but very difficult business although it may not seem like it from the outside, it is very hard, says the great muñidora of the project, who at 84 years old keeps her passion intact, I bought the last work last
