Two museums are swapping 25 paintings each way. From 9 October 2026 to 10 January 2027, the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid shows Dutch and Flemish masterpieces from the Mauritshuis in The Hague, led by Vermeer’s View of Delft. From 15 October 2026 to 17 January 2027, the Mauritshuis shows works from Madrid, including Jan van Eyck’s Annunciation diptych and Piero della Francesca’s Portrait of a Boy. The Mauritshuis calls it the first exchange ever between the two.
The Hague is no random partner, and the collection’s road to Madrid shows a family asset with its own succession plan.
A steel heir in The Hague
Heinrich Thyssen was born in 1875 in Mülheim an der Ruhr, the third son of August Thyssen, who founded the family’s iron and steel business in 1871. After marrying a Hungarian baroness, he was adopted by her father and took the name Thyssen-Bornemisza. According to the Madrid museum, the 1919 Hungarian revolution drove the couple from their castle at Rohoncz (now Rechnitz, Austria) into exile in the Netherlands, where his main businesses were based. The Historical Dictionary of Switzerland says he moved his art collection to The Hague that year. His son Hans Heinrich was born on 13 April 1921 in Scheveningen, the seaside district of The Hague, and went to school in The Hague.
Heinrich’s major purchases began in the late 1920s; the Van Eyck now in The Hague was bought between 1933 and 1935, the museum says. In 1932 he bought the Villa Favorita in Lugano, Switzerland, and built a gallery there.
Split, bought back, sold
When Heinrich died in 1947, most of the collection and fortune went to Hans Heinrich, his youngest son, the museum says. When his siblings put their paintings up for auction, he bought them back. He kept collecting, adding modern art from 1961. Splitting assets among heirs is a classic risk; here one heir paid to reunite them.
The last step was a permanent home. Britain, the Getty and German cities made offers, but the museum says the influence of his Spanish wife, Carmen Cervera, was decisive. In 1988 he signed a contract to lend 775 works to the Spanish state “with a view to their subsequent sale”, and a foundation was set up to manage them. In June 1993 Spain bought the collection for $350 million, according to the museum and The Art Newspaper.
A fair caveat
The museum’s own history is the main source for the inheritance and sale; we found no public terms beyond the price. Sources also differ on detail: the museum says most of the collection passed to Hans Heinrich, while the Swiss dictionary says he bought back all of it.
What to watch
- Whether this first exchange leads to more.
- The future of Carmen Cervera’s own collection in the Madrid museum; in 2021 The Art Newspaper reported a planned 15-year rental to the state with an option to buy.
- Whether other collecting families choose a sale to the state over a split.
Questions to bring to your advisors
Who will own our art, or any other collection, after us: one heir, several, a foundation or a museum? Is that written down, with a valuation, before the question arises? These are questions to bring to your advisors, not advice.