The Exhibition Room of the Astoria Hotel houses the largest existing collection of paintings and drawings by Ricard Opisso, a great Catalonian artist who was one of the best at reflecting Barcelona life in the first half of the 20th century.

The permanent exhibition, which occupies five rooms of the hotel, consists of over 400 works including drawings, illustrations, oil paintings, watercolours and posters, which form part of Derby Hotels Collection’s private art collection, and a collection of the painter’s documents donated by his granddaughter, Mariangeles Opisso. These include portraits of some of Opisso’s contemporaries and artist friends such as Ramón Casas, Isidre Nonell, Toulouse-Lautrec and Pablo Picasso. 

Opisso, who at the tender age of 12 began working with the architect Antoni Gaudí on the Sagrada Familia and from whom he learned the trade of draughtsmanship, is considered one of the leading chroniclers of society of his time. A member of the Els Quatre Gats group, he resided in Barcelona and Paris. His works, full of irony, social comment and political satire, were published in Catalonian and French magazines such as L’Esquella de la Torratxa, Cu-Cut!, Le Rire and Ruy-Blas. 

The collection is completed by a number of modernist sculptures in alabaster from the early 20th century, as well as a collection of posters from the same period.