Bilbao Fine Arts Museum

Most visitors to Bilbao head for the titanium curves of the Guggenheim and miss the older museum a short walk away in a green city park. The Bilbao Fine Arts Museum was founded in 1908, long before the Basque city reinvented itself as an art destination, and it holds the kind of collection the newcomer does not: centuries of paintings reaching from the 13th century to today.

Set inside the Doña Casilda Iturrizar park, its building joins a sober 1945 classical block to later modern wings. The walls carry Spanish old masters, an El Greco, works by Francisco de Zurbarán and Francisco de Goya, next to a strong showing of Basque painters and a handful of French names, among them a Gauguin painted during his stay in Arles. Founded as a civic collection and expanded over a century, it opened its doors to the public in 1914, more than 80 years before the Guggenheim arrived to make the city's name.