On 5 February 1976, husband and wife collectors Irene and Peter Ludwig donated 350 modern artworks from their collection to the city of Cologne and thus laid the foundations for the Museum Ludwig, which was to be a home for art made after 1900. 1986 saw the opening of the ‘twin museum’, which encompassed both the Wallraf-Richartz Museum and the Museum Ludwig, but already by 1994 it was decided to physically separate the two. Apart from the most extensive collection of American Pop Art outside of the USA, the Ludwigs’ donation meant that the museum received absolutely top quality works by the Russian avant-garde from the period between 1905 and 1935. In 1994 came 90 works from their Picasso holdings, followed by 774 more in 2001, meaning that the Museum Ludwig now has the third largest Picasso collection worldwide, only after Barcelona and Paris. Today the Ludwig Collection covers the major approaches in twentieth century and contemporary art.

The basis of the Ludwig Collection was unwittingly created by the Cologne lawyer Dr Josef Haubrich. In 1946 he entrusted the city with his important collection of works by the Expressionists and other representatives of “classic” modernism. This donation was later transferred to the holdings of the Museum Ludwig.

Since 2000, the Museum Ludwig has been notably involved in collecting and presenting technical media in the contemporary art context. Since 2001 the collection has expanded in the field of contemporary art by the inclusion of key works and integral groups of pieces, and today ranks with its almost 60,580 works among the leading museums for modern and contemporary art in Europe.