At the end of the 60s family Ludwig created the largest Pop Art collection outside the USA and gifted a major part to the City of Cologne. In 1976 this formed the basis for the foundation of the Museum Ludwig. Apart from Pop Art the Ludwigs gave an extensive collection of Russian Avantgarde from the period 1906 to 1930 and several hundred works by Pablo Picasso as a permanent loan to the new museum, which meanwhile with 180 originals and 730 works of graphic art has the third largest Picasso collection worldwide.