The Musée national Picasso-Paris plans to reunite the museum garden with the public square and recreate the garden’s original seventeenth-century footprint. Around ten Picasso bronzes will be placed there, where they will be visible free of charge.
The garden is one part of Picasso 2030, a project estimated by the museum at €50 million. The institution says it will be entirely self-financed, among other means through the Fondation du Musée Picasso, Académie des beaux-arts and its patrons. Works are due to begin from 2028, with the transformed museum expected to open at the end of 2030.
The plans also include a redesigned wing for temporary exhibitions. The ground floor and basement of the Hôtel Salé, spaces designed in 2010 by Jean-François Bodin, will be reorganised. The museum distinguishes these existing spaces from the new exhibition facility, rather than presenting them as a single extension.
The project follows an exceptional agreement with Picasso’s heirs allowing posthumous bronze casts of sculptures by the artist. Four of these bronzes have been acquired by the DQ Art Foundation, a patron of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, which will donate them to the museum. They include La Chèvre (1950), La Guenon et son petit (1952) and Petite fille sautant à la corde (1950), alongside Tête de femme (1931). The museum’s future garden is planned to contain around ten bronzes, but its announcement does not identify those works as a fixed group of four.
Paloma Ruiz Picasso, Administratrice de la Succession Picasso, had long rejected the principle of posthumous casts. She accepted this operation after considering its potential to bring greater attention to a less familiar part of Picasso’s sculpture.
An international architecture and landscape competition will launch on 29 May. Applications close on 6 July 2026, five candidates will be shortlisted, and the jury is due to meet in January 2027. The winner is expected to be announced between January and February.
