Which are the best museums of the Western World? While such list is entirely subjective, I have tried to be as objective as I can be, taking in consideration its collections and history. So here is a guide to the premier Museums of the Western World and a link to its websites:

 

1- The Louvre in Paris is arguably the world's most famous Museum. Take an online tour through its wonderful collection of antiquities and European painting, including -of course- Leonardo's Gioconda

2- The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is arguably America's greatest museum. Its spectacular collection is especially strong in American painting and Egyptian Antiquities.

3- The British Museum is England's greatest museum -and one of the best in the world- of Ancient Arts and antiquities, with an excellent collection of Art from Ancient Egypt to the Middle Ages.

4- The Vatican Museums houses the inmense and outstanding Art collection of the Catholic Church. Here you'll find some of the most important works of Art of the History, such as the Sistine Chapel or Raphael's The School of Athens

5- The Hermitage Museum (or Ermitage) is the most important Museum in Russia and also the largest Art collection in the world. More than 3,000,000 million of artworks, from the stone age to the post-impressionism

6- The Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna is one of the premier museums in the world. It houses an important collection of Egyptian, Greek and Roman antiquities, and an outstanding collection of European painting.

7- The National Gallery of London houses one of the world's finest collection of European painting, from the 13th to the early 20th century. It is arguably the most complete collection of European painting from the 13th to the 19th centuries

8- The Museum of modern Art (MOMA) houses the world's best collection of modern and contemporary Art, featuring masterworks as Picasso's Demoiselles d'Avignon or van Gogh's Starry night

9- The Museé d'Orsay in Paris is without doubt the best museum of impressionist and 19th century French painting in the world. Features masterworks from Monet, van Gogh, Renoir, Degas...

10- The Cairo Museum is by far the most complete collection of Egyptian Art in the world. Its most famous artworks are the objects from the Tomb of Tutankhamun, discovered in 1922

11- El Museo del Prado (Prado Museum) is Spain's most important museum, featuring the best collection of Spanish painting in the world. Unfortunately, its website is not so complete.

12- The Uffizi in Florence is the most important collection of Italian Renaissance painting. In this excellent website you can works such as Botticelli's Venus or Giotto's Ognisanti Madonna.

13- The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston is one of the oldest and most respected Art institutions of North America, with an outstanding collection of Western Art. It has a sister museum in Japan, the Nagoya Boston Museum of Fine Arts

14- The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam is Netherlands National Museum. As you can expect, it houses the world's most important collection of Dutch painting, including its star piece, Rembrandt's The Nightwatch

15- The National Gallery of Washington features an extremely complete collection of Western painting from the 13th to the 20th century. Its "star sections" are the early Italian Renaissance and the American painting

16- The Guggenheim Museum in New York was designed by the famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright. The Guggenheim Fundation has also important galleries in Bilbao, Venice, Berlin and Las Vegas.

17- The Tate Modern in London is arguably the most important collection of modern and contemporary Art in Europe. It houses pivotal works of artists such as Lichstentein, Pollock or Francis Bacon

18- The Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris is France's national museum for modern and contemporary Art, housed in an important contemporary building by Rogers and Renzo Piano

19- The Art Institute of Chicago houses one of the most outstanding Art collections of the United States, featuring masterpieces such as Seurat's Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte

20- The Getty Center in Malibu is arguably the world's wealthiest Museum, with an important collection of European antiquities, paintings, and manuscripts. Works exhibited includes van Gogh's Irises or Titian's Alfonso d'Avalos

 

There are also a few names more deserving to be in this list: The Tate Britain, which houses the most complete collection of British Art including hundreds of works by Turner; the National Gallery of Scotland, with an important collection of European painting; the Pinacoteca di Brera, with a small but highly important collection of Italian painting, the Gemaldegalerie in Dresden and the Gemaldegalerie in Berlin, perhaps the best collections of European painting in Germany, the Thyssen Museum in Madrid and three important Museums in the East Coast, the Brooklyn Museum and The Frick Collection in NY, and the Philadelphia Art Museum