Museo de Arte Abstracto Español, Modern art museum in the medieval Hanging Houses, Cuenca, Spain
The Museo de Arte Abstracto Español is an arts centre in Cuenca, Spain, housed inside the city's famous Hanging Houses, a medieval building complex that juts out from the cliffs above the Huécar River. The exhibition rooms spread across several floors with irregular layouts and wooden beams, giving the modern paintings and sculptures an unexpected setting.
Fernando Zobel opened the museum in 1966, choosing the Hanging Houses, one of Cuenca's most recognizable medieval buildings, to display his collection of Spanish abstract art from the 1950s and 1960s. The Fundación Juan March later took over responsibility for the collection, continuing to develop it over the following decades.
The museum displays works by artists such as Antonio Saura and Manuel Millares, who helped shape a new visual language in Spain during the mid-20th century. Walking through the rooms, visitors can follow how this generation moved away from representational art toward something more raw and direct.
The museum is reached by walking across a footbridge that spans a gorge, which also gives a good view of the outside of the Hanging Houses. Visitors should wear comfortable shoes, as the floors inside the old rooms can be uneven and the connections between levels are via stairs.
Fernando Zobel painted a large mural directly onto one of the museum's walls, and it is still there today. This makes the building one of the few places where a founder's own work is permanently part of the structure itself, not just displayed inside it.
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