On 1 May 2010, after five years of work, Villa Vauban reopened its doors as the Luxembourg City Art Museum. The grand opening exhibition, realised in collaboration with the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, was inaugurated in the presence of Her Majesty the Queen of the Netherlands and Their Royal Highnesses the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Luxembourg.

The new museum, with its renovated old building and contemporary extension, now has an exhibition surface of 1,000 m2. It regularly hosts temporary exhibitions in its two spaces.
The origins of the building date back to the years 1869 to 1873 when the glove manufacturer Gabriel Mayer had a bourgeois villa built on one of the plots of land vacated a few years earlier following the dismantling of the fortress. The former 17th century fort that was to be integrated into the foundations of the house was called “Fort Vauban” – hence the name that the villa was to bear. Part of the enveloppe of this fort, built in 1739 by the Austrians, can be seen in the basement of the museum!
The villa passed into the hands of the Le Gallais de Gargan family, before being bought by the City of Luxembourg in 1949 with the aim of setting up a museum for its art collections. However, this museum was only created in 1959 when the High Court of Justice of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) left the premises.

Since 2010, Villa Vauban has organised 34 exhibitions on subjects as varied as 17th and 19th century Dutch painting, Luxembourg art from the 19th to the 21st century, masterpieces of European painting, animals or the five senses in art, German impressionism, graphic art and photography. The collections of Villa Vauban have been presented under different aspects and recently in the format “A museum for all” which favours easy and barrier-free access to art.
A varied cultural and educational programme awaits visitors at each exhibition. In addition to the artistic treasures to be discovered at Villa Vauban, its location in the middle of a historic park gives it its unique character.
In 2020, to mark the 10th anniversary, we are (re)introducing you to a selection of 14 exhibitions that have left their mark on Luxembourg's cultural landscape. Feel free to relive these highlights of the City’s Art Museum, and above all, come and visit us just a 10-minute walk from here!