If you are hungry to visit a museum in Lisbon, you’ll have no problem finding one. It has now become a kind of joke between Trev and me. We even found a museum about the 1755 earthquake. Not to diminish it, as it did devastate the city, but there are already museums on natural history and geology, etc. It was just surprising to see a museum dedicated just to that one event, significant though it was.
We also walked by the National Coach Museum, pictured below. I suppose that was a thing here – horse-drawn carriages. The building is huge, clearly because it needs the space. It did peak our curiosity, but that day we were on a mission. We also weren’t interested in buying a ticket to see probably every variation on a coach one could imagine, interesting thought it might have been.
On a different day, another museum we visited was dedicated to the cod fishing industry. We thought it would be interesting to see the European side of the story. Having lived in Eastport and traveled the Canadian Maritimes, the exploitation and history of the cod fishery in those waters is inescapable. Side note: Don’t go to the cod museum, though I actually hesitate to label it a museum. It wears that term loosely and is really more like a theme-park without rides. While I learned a few things, it was WAY more touristy than we like and ultimately disappointing.
Not Just a Museum of Paintings
In looking through the long list, and widespread map, of museums available, one stood out. The Calouste Gulbenkian museum gets a 4.7 out of 13,000+ Google reviews. Further research told us that it isn’t just an art museum in terms of paintings. This guy was a collector on the level of J.P. Morgan; actually, J.P. Morgan on steroids.
If anyone has been to The Morgan Library & Museum in New York City, you have a small inkling of what I’m talking about. Basically, we have an extraordinarily wealthy man, one of the wealthiest in the world in his time, that clearly loved art and antiquities. And his interests were all over the place – Egyptian, Asian, Turkish, Persian, Islamic, and European – from the 11th century up until the mid 20th century when he died.
For us, the extent of the collection wasn’t the only draw. The museum is located in a large park area about a 45-minute walk from our flat. (Sadly, we neglected to take photos but it was a cool, soothing respite from the hot, urban jungle.) For that reason, a trip to this museum would give us some exercise, the ability to soak in the art, and have a picnic lunch/early dinner afterwards before walking back. We went on a Sunday as we learned there is free admission after 2:00 p.m. Why not, right?
When we were there, the building for modern and contemporary items was closed due to a major renovation. To be honest, I don’t know if we would have had the energy to make it through another building. As it was, we spent almost three hours wandering.
Here, I need to give a grateful shout out to my patient husband. He knows me well enough to anticipate that a museum visit with me takes a lot longer than one without me. He takes things in quickly, I don’t. I like to read about items and take my time. I also think I took most of the pictures. I would look up to find that he had already left the room I was in and moved on. Ultimately, I found him waiting for me on a very comfortable couch relaxing and reading more about Gulbenkian. It was nice to pause, and talk about what items in the exhibit wowed each of us.
Born in Turkey, Calouste Gulbenkian was a British-Armenian businessman. During World War II, he moved to Portugal which was neutral (honestly, I thought all of Europe except Switzerland picked a side). As I learned, he spent more than 40 years collecting works and amassed upwards of 6,000 items. The more he collected, the more discerning the eye and the more particular he was about what he bought. Near the end of his life, he expressed a desire for the items to be in a museum, which then led to both the Gulbenkian Foundation and the museum.
A Little Sidenote
From an ethical standpoint, one could debate about whether the source of wealth that amassed this astounding collection was good or bad. At least, I thought about this when I learned that Mr. Gulbenkian was key in opening up the middle eastern oil reserves to the west. Sigh.
Yeah, ok, that bothers me in the same way one might look at the industrialists in America that amassed their own fortunes from oil and poor labor practices and went on to establish well known museums there. And an even further aside, during a recent roadtrip, Trev and I listed to an NPR story about the controversy with many large museums. Mainly, it discussed how some items were acquired in the past (colonialism and empire-building) and the debate on whether they should be returned. It was eye-opening. I find myself suddenly thinking about the movie “Woman in Gold”. While this is a totally different circumstance, it also brings to the fore the need to think about how items came to a particular museum.
At least with the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum it is clear he bought everything. I find this all very interesting since my college degree is in museum sciences. Ok, getting up out of the weeds…. we did go to the Gulbenkian Museum, I did enjoy it tremendously, and it is an amazing place.
Audio Tour, Not
A few days before going, I learned you could download an app to use when there. And then, in true Gail style, completely forgot my headphones for the visit. As in the photo above of an information label, there is a number you can enter into the app and listen to more details about what you are looking at. They offer multiple languages. I listened to some at home and got a kick out of the fact that the English option is recorded by a British man.
I should add, also, that if I had remembered my headphones, Trev would have been ready for dinner by the time I had had my fill. It would have made me want to linger longer at certain items. It also may mean before we leave I go back one day before work.
Fortunately, they allow photographs without a flash. I took a lot of pictures and also kept noting panels with numbers I wanted to listen to later. This seemed so well done and thought through, as did the entire museum experience. It is one of the best museums I’ve ever been to. Many things to see, but not crowded. Spaced in a way that even though we went on the free Sunday afternoon, along with a lot of other people, it never felt crowded. It’s top notch.
Oh My, Lalique
As we got up from that couch to leave, we discovered another exhibit room at the end all to itself. Turns out, Calouste Gulbenkian was good friends, not just a “patron friend”, with Rene Lalique and acquired a very large collection of his work. This room, dedicated just to those items, reopened in 2021. It is astounding. I know very little about Lalique (though I now want to learn more) but am always “squirrel” when it comes to anything Art Nouveau.
As I sit here writing this, I realize for me what makes a good museum. It is when my interest is peaked about a culture, a technique, an artist so much so that I want to go learn more. From seeing still lifes by Henri Latour (and I’ve never really been drawn to still lifes) and the glass work of Lalique, I want to know and see more.
So varied and high quality is this museum that we are debating going to others. We kind of got our fix of paintings, sculptures, antiquities, and decorative arts. And I love decorative arts. Right now, I only have my sights set on one other location. There is a 27-room mansion that is reminiscent of the Frick Collection in New York City. I love old, grand homes still setup as they were when lived in, where one can soak up that period and what life was like for the higher classes. It is on the calendar for a visit on July 1st. Stay tuned. Until then, here is a small gallery of other items from the Gulbenkian Museum.
