Alte Nationalgalerie

The Alte Nationalgalerie stands on Museum Island in Mitte, a neoclassical temple-like building completed in 1876 and modeled on a Corinthian temple, approached by a dramatic double staircase leading up to an equestrian statue of King Friedrich Wilhelm IV. Inside, the collection focuses on 19th-century European painting and sculpture, anchored by the museum's holdings of Caspar David Friedrich's Romantic landscapes, Karl Friedrich Schinkel's architectural paintings, Adolph Menzel's large-scale historical panoramas, and a gallery of French Impressionist works including pieces by Monet and Manet. Visitors typically move chronologically through the upper floors, where the Friedrich room's moody, atmospheric landscapes draw the most sustained attention, before descending to sculpture galleries on the lower level. A visit takes 1.5 to 2 hours, shorter than the larger museums on the island, making it an achievable single stop for visitors with limited time who still want to see major German Romantic painting. Weekday afternoons are quieter than mornings, when tour groups touring the island tend to concentrate at the Pergamon and Neues Museum first before arriving here later. The building's grand exterior staircase and columned facade, best photographed from the Lustgarten looking up toward the entrance, rival the paintings inside as a reason to visit.