Lenbachhaus

If you have time for only one art museum in Munich beyond the Alte Pinakothek, make it the Lenbachhaus. The museum, officially the Municipal Gallery in the Lenbachhaus, occupies the Italianate villa that the society painter Franz von Lenbach, the most celebrated portraitist of late-nineteenth-century Germany, built for himself in the 1880s and 1890s near the Koenigsplatz, together with a modern extension by Norman Foster's practice, clad in brass-coloured metal, which opened in 2013. Lenbach's own grand rooms, with their gilded ceilings and old-master atmosphere, can still be seen, but the museum's fame rests on something very different: the world's most important collection of the Blue Rider, Der Blaue Reiter, the group of artists who, in Munich around 1911 and 1912, made some of the first steps into abstraction. The collection exists largely thanks to Gabriele Muenter, Kandinsky's partner, who hid hundreds of his works and her own in her house in Murnau through the Nazi years, when they were condemned as degenerate, and gave them to the city in 1957. Here you can follow Wassily Kandinsky's path from colourful Bavarian landscapes to pure abstraction, and see the vivid animals of Franz Marc, including the famous Blue Horse, along with works by Muenter, August Macke, Alexej von Jawlensky, Marianne von Werefkin and Paul Klee. The museum also has strong holdings of Munich painting of the nineteenth century, New Objectivity and contemporary art, including large installations. Admission is ten euros, six reduced, with the audio guide included, and under-18s go free; on the first Thursday of each month, the extra+ evening offers free entry. The museum is closed on Mondays. The Kunstbau, its underground exhibition space in the Koenigsplatz U-Bahn station, is closed throughout 2026 for energy-efficient renovation.

How to plan your visit: go straight to the Blue Rider galleries, which are the heart of the museum, and allow at least an hour and a half for them and Lenbach's historic rooms; two to three hours if you want to see the contemporary collection and temporary exhibitions too. The audio guide is included in the ticket and adds useful context. The cafe-restaurant and the garden, which you can visit free during opening hours, are pleasant for a break. The Lenbachhaus is a short walk from the Koenigsplatz U-Bahn station, the NS-Dokumentationszentrum, the Glyptothek and the Pinakotheken, so it slots naturally into a day in the Kunstareal.

When to go: weekday mornings are calm; weekends and rainy days are busier. The museum opens Tuesday to Sunday and on public holidays, with one late opening each week, so check the current hours before you go. The free first-Thursday evenings, extra+, are lively, with music and events, but crowded. If you plan to visit several Kunstareal museums over a longer stay, ask about the Kunstareal annual ticket, which covers many museums in the quarter.

Why it is special: there are Kandinskys and Marcs in museums across the world, but nowhere else can you see the Blue Rider in such depth, in the city where it began, and with the story of Muenter's courage behind it. Combine it with a day trip to Murnau, where the Muenter House shows where she and Kandinsky lived and painted, if you want to follow the story further.