Magnólia Costa interview: "Our mission is to make art accessible to the largest number of people as possible"

Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo (MAM) is located at Ibirapuera Park, the largest park of the city. The museum for Brazilian modern and contemporary art was founded in 1948. Its building has been adapted by Brazilian architect Lina Bo Bardi, while world famous Brazilian landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx, designed the museum’s sculpture garden. Cultural Exchange Brazil – The Netherlands interviewed Dr. Magnólia Costa Santos, Head of Institutional Affairs at MAM, about what makes the museum special.

Mrs. Costa, could you tell us something about MAM’s collection of artworks and its exhibitions?

“Our collection contains Brazilian modern and contemporary art. We have more than 5,000 artworks from well-known artists like Candido Portinari, Emiliano Di Cavalcanti, Tarsila do Amaral, Victor Brecheret, Laura Lima, Regina Silveira, Nelson Leirner and José Damasceno, among many others. The collection of books, periodicals, documents and audiovisual material in our library comprises around 50,000 titles.

Each year we have four new exhibitions. One of them consists of artworks from our own collection. Sometimes we show experimental art in an exhibition, sometimes we have a blockbuster. Every two years MAM organizes an international exhibition as well as a so-called Panorama da Arte Brasileira, an exhibition resulting from mapping contemporary art production in Brazil. The latter has become an important exhibition in the art world.

In the museum’s main corridor we have The Wall Project where every half a year another artist makes an art installation. We also have the project Resident DJ where different DJ’s and musicians create soundtracks together, for the different rooms of the museum. MAM is constantly enlarging its collection. We ask artists to make artworks specifically for the museum.”

What are MAM’s main objectives?

“It is our mission to make Brazilian modern and contemporary art accessible to the largest number of people as possible. Therefore you can find almost our complete collection online on our website.

We frequently do ‘crossovers’: in 2012 we had the programme Meetings of Art and Gastronomy where visual artists worked together with well-known chefs de cuisine to create artistic-taste experiences for the public. Other crossover exhibitions that we had link contemporary art with architecture and ecology, partly because of the museum’s garden. The idea is to integrate people, but also to provoke discussions related to food, waste or sustainability for example.

MAM offers a variety of courses about the history of art, art criticism, photography, and fine arts. In our studio we have art workshops for children and schools can visit our museum free of charge. Activities are accessible to all: there are no physical, sensorial, mental, intellectual or social barriers. Our public is very diverse.”

Could you elaborate further on “access for all” to MAM’s activities?

“Our facilities are not only accessible to visitors with disabilities, we actively try to facilitate and enrich their experiences with art. We give sculpture courses for blind and visually impaired people and story telling for children with sign language interpreters, to give you an idea.

Our education department works together with the Skyway Foundation in Rotterdam: in April this year we realized another SenCity multi-sensorial event for free, that brings deaf- and hearing impaired, and hearing people together. It was again a big success. We had a vibrating dance floor, aromas released according to the music and ‘sign dancers’ for example. (From the Netherlands participated VJ Mark Ridder and sign dancers Serhat Agacan and Dewi Latupeirissa, ed.)”  

Does MAM work together with Dutch artists or others from the Netherlands?

“In general we are interested in exchanging art with a country like the Netherlands. In 2008 Dutch visual artist Barbara Visser participated in one of our expositions with audiovisual work. Colombian curator Inti Guerrero, formerly based in the Netherlands, created in 2010 the group exhibition The city of the naked man in MAM. Furthermore we work together with ING in São Paulo: art works from our collection are being displayed in their office spaces.”

Dr. Magnólia Costa Santos is a philosopher, translator and art critic specialized in 17th Century Franco-Italian Art. She received her PhD in Philosophy from the University of São Paulo (USP) and is a lecturer on contemporary art history and Brazilian culture at MAM, where she acts as Head of Institutional Affairs.

Visit the website of Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo: http://www.mam.org.br

Search in MAM’s online collection: http://www.mam.org.br/acervo

More about the Skyway Foundation and SenCity events on http://www.stichtingskyway.nl

Interview & text by: Josine Backus