All activities / Museums & Galleries / Vilnius
Museums & Galleries in Vilnius
Lithuania's capital, a Baltic city on the Neris whose UNESCO-listed Old Town, one of the largest in Central and Eastern Europe, mixes Gothic, Renaissance and baroque churches with a lively contemporary art, food and festival scene, including the self-declared artists' quarter of Uzupis.
Why here
Vilnius lets you read the whole arc of Lithuanian art in a single day. At MO Museum, a Daniel Libeskind building opened in 2018 holds around six thousand works from the 1960s to now, including art the Soviet regime tried to suppress. A short walk or ride away, the National Gallery of Art lays out the twentieth and twenty-first century collections of the Lithuanian National Museum of Art across ten halls. Between the two you get the national modern story and its contemporary edge, both with English-language tours, and neither swamped by crowds the way the big Western European museums are.
Best months
Both museums are indoor and open year-round, so this pairing works in any season and is a strong bad-weather option. Both close on Mondays; weekday mornings are quietest. The National Gallery of Art is free on the last Sunday of each month.
Getting there & around
MO Museum sits just south of the Old Town near the Halle Market, an easy walk from the centre. The National Gallery of Art is across the river on Konstitucijos pr. 22 in the Snipiskes business district, a short bus or taxi hop or a longer riverside walk. Both offer English guided tours; check tour times and any temporary-exhibition ticketing in advance.
Skill levels: beginner
Schools & guides (2)
MO Museum
OrganizerMO Museum opened on 18 October 2018 in a building by Daniel Libeskind and the Lithuanian firm Do Architects, the studio's first cultural project in the Baltic region. Founded by scientists and philanthropists Danguole and Viktoras Butkus, it holds around 6,000 works of modern and contemporary Lithuanian art from the 1960s to today, including pieces once deemed unacceptable by Soviet authorities. It runs changing exhibitions and English-language guided tours.
National Gallery of Art, Vilnius
OrganizerThe National Gallery of Art is the modern and contemporary wing of the Lithuanian National Museum of Art, at Konstitucijos pr. 22 on the north bank of the Neris. Its permanent display traces Lithuanian art of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries across ten collection halls, with a grand hall for temporary shows. The gallery runs English-language guided tours and an education centre, and admission is free on the last Sunday of each month. A renewed permanent display opened in April 2025.