When the Medellín Museum of Modern Art was founded in 1978, it had no physical home. Nor any collection to speak of. However, its founders — a group of young local artists, predominantly — thought that Medellín needed a ‘forum’ (their word) in which the city’s burgeoning contemporary art scene could thrive.
They felt excluded by Medellín’s main cultural institution, the century-old Museum of Antioquia, which dedicated itself to fine arts and eschewed anything that might be deemed in the slightest bit avant-garde.
‘We’ve come a long way since then,’ says María Mercedes González. She has been director of the Medellín Museum of Modern Art (widely known as ‘el MAMM’) for 12 years. I’m speaking to her in her office, high up in the five-storey building that the museum today calls home.
In 2023, it welcomed 163,000 visitors — more than any other year in its history. ‘Everyone here now owes our predecessors a debt,’ says González. ‘Not just the founders, but the figures [in charge] after them, who showed great will to keep the museum going through difficult times.’
