A short three blocks from our hotel lies the Museu Picasso, housed in an extraordinary building made of several connected Gothic palaces. It was our first leisurely morning since we arrived, as our tickets were for the 10:00am opening.

If you like art museums, you’d love the Museu Picasso. The most striking element about the exhibits to me was the perfect lighting that the curators have been able to achieve. No shadows, no glare, no color distortions—it just could not have been done any better. The flow of the museum was easy and natural. (Contrast that to the Dali museum, where there were many dead ends and needless loops.) Like the fabulous Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam, the curators presented Picasso’s works in essentially chronological order, from some very sophisticated oils he did when he was 14 to his modern paintings and ceramics. Seeing his style develop over time is a wonderful experience.

The gem of the entire exhibit is the series of rooms devoted to Picasso’s careful study, deconstruction, and reconstruction of Velasquez’ Las Meninas, considered by most people to be the pinnacle of classical European art. Picasso obviously loved the painting, creating not only his version of the masterpiece but also dozens of studies and interpretations of various characters and themes of the original work. There is a lot of whimsy in his work, but you can also see how his progression into cubism developed, as he experimented with various geometric forms and perspectives.

I’m also fascinated by Picasso’s notebooks and sketches, as you can tell from the photos I took.

Some photos, but once again, the Photo Dump is the place to be.