The Rally museums is actually a group of 5 museums founded by the banker Harry Recanati. The museum in Marbella is one of them. The museums are open to public free of charge since the founder wanted to share his collection of modern Latin American arts with as many people as possible. The museums are private and not subsidised in any way. More information about the collection but also about the founder and this family of bakers is on their website: https://www.rallimuseums.com/en/Gallery_Ralli_Museums
On the way to Puerto Banus In Marbella (and the huge yachts and expensive cars) you will find this nice museum packed with beautiful art. I visited the museum in June ’22 and learned that there is a permanent collection but also regular new expositions so visiting the museum from time to time may be worthwhile to do.
The first thing that I saw is, that except for me and a young student at the reception, nobody was in the museum. Obviously people don’t come to Puerto Banus for a museum. So it was quiet but cool and pleasant to walk around. There were a lot of paintings by for me known artist most of it surrealism. But also work from celebrities like Dali were there to enjoy. But most impressive were statues of gossiping women. Two of them. The statues are not described as part of the permanent collection but moving them around from one museum to an other would be quite a project.
The nice thing about this museum is that there are foldable chairs that you can pick up at the entrance and use them wherever you like in the museum. You don’t have to stand in front of your favourite work but sit and comfortably enjoy. I used it in front of the gossiping ladies to make a quick sketch.
The ladies are obviously friends since they embrace each other and one is trying to listen carefully while the other seems to whisper. The listening lady looks unhappy. This could be a picture from the streets except that the ladies are naked. That nakedness is confusing like in Manet’s Le déjeuner sur l’herbe. Later on, in the hotel, I made a aquarel vignette of the statue.