Neue Pinakothek

The Neue Pinakothek (New Pinakothek) is an art museum in Munich, Germany. Its focus is European Art of the 18th and 19th century and is one of the most important museums of art of the nineteenth century in the world. Together with the Alte Pinakothek and the Pinakothek der Moderne it is part of Munich's "Kunstareal" (the "art area").

The museum was founded by the former King Ludwig I of Bavaria in 1853. The original building constructed by Friedrich von Gärtner and August von Voit was destroyed during World War II. The ruin of the Neue Pinakothek was demolished in 1949. Designed by architect Alexander Freiherr von Branca the new postmodern building with features such as arched windows, keystones, bay windows and stairways, opened in 1981. It combines a concrete construction with a stone facade design.

Ludwig began to collect contemporary art already as crown prince in 1809 and his collection has been steadily enlarged. When the museum was founded, the separation to the old masters in the Alte Pinakothek was fixed with the period shortly before the turn of the 19th century, which has become a prototype for many galleries.

Owing to the personal preference of Ludwig I there was initially a strong focus on paintings of German Romanticism and the Munich School. Also dynastic considerations played a role as Greece had become a secundogeniture of Bavaria in 1832. In 1834 Carl Rottmann travelled to Greece to prepare for a commission from Ludwig for a cycle of great Greek landscapes which was installed in the Neue Pinakothek, where the paintings were given their own hall.

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