8 Best Sights in Catalonia, Valencia, and the Costa Blanca, Spain

Valencia was a thriving center of artistic activity in the 15th century—one reason that the city's Museum of Fine Arts, with its lovely palm-shaded cloister, is among the best in Spain. Its permanent collection includes many of the finest paintings by Jacomart and Juan Reixach, members of the group known as the Valencian Primitives, as well as work by Hieronymus Bosch—or El Bosco, as they call him here. The ground floor has a number of brooding, 17th-century Tenebrist masterpieces by Francisco Ribalta and his pupil José Ribera, a Diego Velázquez self-portrait, and a room devoted to Goya.

The museum is at the edge of the Jardines del Real (Royal Gardens; open daily 8–dusk), with its fountains, rose gardens, tree-lined avenues, and small zoo. To get here, cross the old riverbed by the Puente de la Trinidad (Trinity Bridge) to the north bank. 

This is the most interesting museum in Sitges, established by the bohemian artist and cofounder of El Quatre Gats café in Barcelona, Santiago Rusiñol (1861–1931), and containing some of his own paintings together with works by El Greco and Picasso. Connoisseurs of wrought iron will love the beautiful collection of cruces terminales, crosses that once marked town boundaries. 

"Museum" was not a big enough word for Dalí, so he christened his monument a theater. In fact, the building was once the Força Vella theater, reduced to a ruin in the Spanish Civil War. Now topped with a glass geodesic dome and studded with Dalí's iconic egg shapes, the multilevel structure pays homage to his fertile imagination and artistic creativity. It includes gardens, ramps, and a spectacular drop cloth Dalí painted for Les Ballets de Monte Carlo. Don't look for his greatest paintings here, although there are some memorable images, including Gala at the Mediterranean, which takes the body of Gala (Dalí's wife) and morphs it into the image of Abraham Lincoln once you look through coin-operated viewfinders.

The sideshow theme continues with other coin-operated pieces, including Taxi Plujós (Rainy Taxi), in which water gushes over the snail-covered occupants sitting in a Cadillac once owned by Al Capone, or Sala de Mae West, a trompe-l'oeil vision in which a pink sofa, two fireplaces, and two paintings morph into the face of the onetime Hollywood sex symbol. Fittingly, another "exhibit" on view is Dalí's own crypt.

The modern Valencian painter and sculptor José Benlliure (1858–1937) is known for his intimate portraits and massive historical and religious paintings, many of which hang in Valencia's Museo de Bellas Artes (Museum of Fine Arts). Here in his elegant house and studio are 50 of his works, including paintings, ceramics, sculptures, and drawings. Also on display are works by his son, Pepino, who painted in the small, flower-filled garden in the back of the house, and iconographic sculptures by Benlliure's brother, the well-known sculptor Mariano Benlliure.

Dedicated to modern and contemporary art, this blocky building on the edge of the old city—where the riverbed makes a loop—houses a permanent collection of 20th-century avant-garde painting, European Informalism (including the Spanish artists Antonio Saura, Antoni Tàpies, and Eduardo Chillida), pop art, and photography. 

The Episcopal Palace near the cathedral contains the wide-ranging collections of Girona's main art museum. On display is everything from superb Romanesque majestats (carved wood figures of Christ) to reliquaries from Sant Pere de Rodes, illuminated 12th-century manuscripts, and works of the 20th-century Olot school of landscape painting.

American industrialist Charles Deering’s magnificent early 20th-century palace, perched on a cliff overlooking the Mediterranean, is home to this eclectic collection that spans 10 centuries. It includes Romanesque and Gothic altarpieces, paintings from the Neoclassic period, and Modernisme works by artists linked to Sitges. It’s worth a visit if only to see the dedicated sculpture room, with noucentista sculptures by Joan Rebull framed by enormous windows offering jaw-dropping views of crashing waves below.

In a lovingly restored 14th-century house, this museum is said to be Catalonia's first dedicated to modern art. It is home to one of the only three Chagall paintings in Spain, Celestial Violinist.