History of the Collections

The Reina Sofía Centre for Art gained National Museum status in 1988 as part of a programme to establish a collection that would unite the state's disparate stock of modern and contemporary art. The Permanent Collection of the new Reina Sofía National Museum and Centre for Art was thus unveiled in 1992, with a perspective for long-term growth. 

The first seed was sown with the incorporation of the entire holdings of the Spanish Museum of Contemporary Art (or MEAC, for its Spanish acronym). Founded as a modern art museum in 1894 but obsolete by 1988, the MEAC owned works distinguished in contests run by the National Exhibition of Fine Art in Madrid and the Spanish Academy in Rome, along with representative pieces from the avant-garde acquired through donation and tax-relief gifts, such as by the estates of Julio González (1973) and Joan Miró (1985). The MEAC's collection was then supplemented by the Prado Museum's stock of 20th-century art, including a remarkable array of Cubist paintings donated by art historian Douglas Cooper. 

Tomàs Llorens, the Museo Reina Sofía's first director, was assigned the task of shaping the inaugural collection. His plan, launched in 1989, proposed that the collection tell the story of the evolution of modern art from a Spanish perspective, with Pablo Picasso as the centrifugal force. One or two early donations were especially significant: Salvador Dalí's bequest in 1990, via his will, ensured complete representation of an essential chapter in the history of the avant-garde; and the transfer of Pablo Picasso's Guernica, from the Prado in July 1992, gave the museum a cornerstone around which to build the collection's narrative. In September of that same year, with the museum now under the directorship of María Corral, the new Permanent Collection was officially unveiled, with three hundred and sixty pieces (out of a total holding of thirteen thousand works) arranged into twenty-three different areas. 

In 1995, Royal Decree 410/1995 determined that the year of Picasso's birth (1881) would mark the cut-off point for the state's two major collections, at the Prado and the Reina Sofía. This gave the collection a definite chronological starting point from which to grow, as it had been doing through a robust acquisition policy aimed at Spanish and international art. An initiative known as Operation Picasso proved particularly influential: developed as a policy in the 1990s, principally under the directorship of José Guirao, it involved a push to buy a significant number of works by Picasso from the artist's heirs, giving the collection full representation of Picasso's output and affording Guernica its historical and aesthetic context. In 1995, Guirao instigated a reorganisation of the permanent collection, extending its display to the fourth floor of the Sabatini building and increasing the number of works on view to five hundred. A further ninety-six works were added to the collection in 1997 from the Telefónica Collection, initially on loan for a period of four years, but later extended. 

From 2000 onwards, under the directorship of Juan Manuel Bonet, the collection began to spread its wings with sections displayed at different national and international venues, and new space allocated at the museum itself to exhibit film and audiovisual work for the first time. In 2005, the new director Ana Martínez de Aguilar launched a project to renovate the Sabatini Building so that the collection could be displayed on all four floors, in a chronological reorganisation that sought to place Spanish artists in their international context and increase the number of works on view to seven hundred. Successive acquisitions expanded the scope of the collection and made it more international, in support of a narrative that now ranged from the origins of modernity to contemporary production, spurred by further donations and gifts that incorporated bodies of work by Jacques Lipchitz (1997), Robert Capa (1999), Antonio Saura (2001), Gustavo Torner (2004), Brassaï (2009), Roberto Matta (2011) and José Val del Omar (2012), among others. 

During Manuel Borja-Villel's tenure as director, new additions sought to introduce new lines of interest that would enrich the collection's narrative and interpretation, while completing certain sections and filling in gaps. Works from the historical avant-garde were added with the emphasis on women from outside the traditional canon, such as Rosario de Velasco, Ángeles Santos, Remedios Varo and Delhy Tejero. This was part of an overall acquisition policy that prioritised the introduction of work by female artists, from the avant-garde period but also from the present day. In parallel, Spanish exile became another strategic line of enquiry as the museum sought to recover work produced by Spanish artists living abroad and shine a light on the contributions they made to their respective contexts. Acquisitions made in the context of organising major exhibitions, and all the preparatory research this entails, also increased, with the 2016 show Campo Cerrado: Art and Power in Post-War Spain a prime example. A number of important documentary collections were also incorporated, such as the Lafuente Archive, acquired in 2022, which will have its own base in Santander from 2027. The permanent collection thus came to be conceived of as a kind of atlas, cemented by a complete reorganisation in 2021 under the title Communicating Vessels. 

In recent years, the collection has expanded in terms of formats (cinema and video, which have long been earmarked for expansion and development, alongside performance art and other live arts), but also in terms of historical areas and geographical frameworks. This allows for the development, from the present day and the city of Madrid, of plural narratives in relation to global art today, but also in terms of precursors and possible echoes. In this fashion, the museum has strengthened its commitment to gender parity (For example, in 2024, more than 50% of the women artists added to the Collection through non-auction acquisitions by the Ministry of Culture and the Museo) and the representation of artists from Latin America, now considered a primary line of work. The same goes for emerging and mid-career Spanish artists, for being contemporary is still etched in the museum's DNA. Furthermore, these developments are all based on sustainability, inclusion and the broadening of artistic representation, concepts that underpin the institution's current philosophy. A new reorganisation of the permanent collection began in 2023 and will be completed in 2028. 

Numerous donations in recent years have emphasised how essential this form of acquisition is to the collection's development and enrichment. The contribution made by artists themselves needs highlighting, with significant works donated to the museum by the likes of José Luis Alexanco, Antoni Mercader (a member of the Grup de Treball collective) and Juan Genovés. Among the foreign artists who have donated work, Dias & Riedweg, León Ferrari, Chris Killip and Amos Gitai have all made especially noteworthy contributions. 

Another highlight was the donation of 483 works by 13 Spanish photographers connected to the Afal group: Joan Colom, Gabriel Cualladó, Gonzalo Juanes, Paco Gómez, Oriol Maspons, Xavier Miserachs, Ramón Masats, Ricard Terré, Leopoldo Pomés, Francisco Ontañón, Carlos Pérez Siquier, Alberto Schommer and Julio Ubiña. This donation, care of the Autric-Tamayo family, helped consolidate the Museo Reina Sofía's position as a primary centre for the study and research of Spanish photography. Other standout donations include: one hundred engravings by Roberto Matta donated by Germana Matta; five sculptures by Pablo Gargallo donated by the artist's daughter, Pierrette Gargallo-Anguera, in 2017; and several films by Marcel Broodthaers, donated by Maria Gilissen Broodthaers. More recently, the architectural archives of José Antonio Coderch, José María García de Paredes and José Miguel de Prada Poole, and the documentary collections of José Luis Fernández del Amo and Martín Domínguez, all donated by their respective heirs; the Gómez de Liaño Archive, donated by the artist himself; and a significant donation made by gallery owner Juana de Aizpuru. 

In addition to donations, noteworthy additions to the collection include outstanding works bequeathed in wills: the photographic works and drawings of Brassaï, bequeathed to the museum by his widow, Gilberte Jacqueline Boyer, and two works by the American painter Morris Louis, bequeathed in the will of his widow, Marcella Brenner. 

Besides purchases and donations, another important means of enhancing the collection is through loan-deposits. In order to improve the collection's representation of artists or trends where work is not available on the market, or is especially difficult for the museum to acquire, an array of significant works have been added in the form of temporary deposits. Noteworthy agreements for the loan of works include collaborations with the Palazuelo Foundation and Miró Estate, and with The Easton Foundation for early works by Louise Bourgeois. Highlights from recent years include the deposit of an exceptional selection of works from the Fondation Gandur pour l'Art, among the most prestigious international collections of post-war European art, and the 2016 incorporation of an outstanding selection of Cubist paintings from the Telefónica Collection, featuring artists such as Juan Gris, María Blanchard, Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes. Other specific deposits come as the result of collaborations with institutions, such as those from the ABC Collection Foundation and the University of Navarra Museum. 

Other noteworthy deposits include a selection of Latin American art from the Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Collection, which the museum held until 2023, the Susana and Ricardo Steinbruch Collection, held until 2024, and a selection of works from the Onnasch Collection. In the same vein, standout deposits - with a pledge of bequest - include a group of works from the Soledad Lorenzo Collection, and a selection of works by Enrique Herreros from the Enrique Herreros Foundation. 

A number of collaborations with the families of artists have proved to be particularly significant. For example, the deposits of outstanding collections of works by foreign artists such as Oskar Schlemmer and André Masson, and Spanish artists including Luis Quintanilla, Ángeles Santos and Manolo Millares, resulted in important acquisitions for the museum. 

Since its establishment in late 2012, the Museo Reina Sofía Foundation has enabled the incorporation of over 1,000 significant works, by 344 different artists, deposited in the museum for an indefinite period. Deposits made through the foundation have led to the incorporation of works by artists such as Allan Sekula, Ibon Aranberri, Cristina Iglesias, Carmen Laffón, Sheroanawe Hakihiiwe, Román Ondák, Yto Barrada and Ângela Ferreira, among many others, as well as numerous donations over time, such as by Eva Lootz, who donated her own work in 2023, a dozen works donated by the collector Jorge Pérez, and others by Mercedes Vilardell and Mario Cáder-Frech, all of which demonstrate the foundation's continued commitment to enriching the museum's permanent collection. Important deposits also come through the foundation's American branch, the Museo Reina Sofía Foundation (USA), a private non-profit organisation set up with the stated objective of supporting the foundation and the museum. Acquisitions made through the MRSF (USA) are deposited in the Museo Reina Sofía for renewable five-year periods. Another of the foundation's declared objectives is to provide a public service through the holdings it deposits at the museum. Its statutes stipulate that, in the event of dissolution, all assets and rights become the property of the Museo Reina Sofía.