Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

Museo Guggenheim Bilbao / Guggenheim Bilbao Museoa
The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, along the Nervión Estuary in central Bilbao
Established	18 October 1997; 26 years ago (1997-10-18)
Location	Abando, Bilbao, Spain
Coordinates	43°16′07″N 2°56′02″W / 43.26861°N 2.93389°W / 43.26861; -2.93389
Type	Art museum
Visitors	1 289 147 (2022)[1]
Director	Juan Ignacio Vidarte
Public transit access	Bilbao tram
Website	guggenheim-bilbao.eus

The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is a museum of modern and contemporary art designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry, and located in Bilbao, province of Biscay, Spain. The museum was inaugurated on 18 October 1997 by King Juan Carlos I of Spain, with an exhibition of 250 contemporary works of art. Built alongside the Nervion River, which runs through the city of Bilbao to the Cantabrian Sea, it is one of several museums belonging to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and features permanent and visiting exhibits of works by Spanish and international artists. It is one of the largest museums in Spain.

A work of contemporary architecture, the building has been hailed as a "signal moment in the architectural culture", because it represents "one of those rare moments when critics, academics, and the general public were all completely united about something", according to architectural critic Paul Goldberger.^[2] The museum was the building most frequently named as one of the most important works completed since 1980 in the 2010 World Architecture Survey among architecture experts.^[2]