MAC Lima

The Museum of Contemporary Art of Lima (Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Lima, MAC Lima) is a contemporary art museum located in the Barranco District of Lima, Peru. It is the only museum in the city specialized in the dissemination of modern and contemporary art. Operating as a private non-profit organization, MAC Lima aims to be an institution integrated into its urban environment, connected with the artistic community, and engaged with the sensibilities and debates of its time. It is managed by the Institute of Contemporary Art (Instituto de Arte Contemporáneo, IAC) and houses the principal works of the IAC collection.

The museum's origins trace back to the foundation of the Institute of Contemporary Art (IAC) on June 11, 1955. The IAC was inaugurated in the former premises of the Galeria de Lima on jiron Ocana, with attendees including Jose Sabogal and Fernando de Szyszlo. The institution relocated several times, moving to the Casa Mujica on Calle Belen in 1966, and occupying the Museum of Italian Art between 1969 and 1972. In 1981, plans for a dedicated contemporary art museum began, and by the late 1980s, the IAC firmly committed to constructing a museum and endowing it with a collection. The museum was formally inaugurated in late January 2013.

The IAC collection began taking shape from exhibitions held across its early venues. The initial phase features works from the 1950s and 1960s, providing a rich panorama of Latin American art of the period, including the vigorous abstraction of Fernando de Szyszlo. In the 1990s, an auction held to raise initial funds for the museum's construction brought a major influx of works from leading continental artists. This expanded the collection into geometric abstraction, kinetic art, conceptual art, and narrative figuration. Following the museum's construction, further donations enhanced the representativity of contemporary art, including national artists and contributions supported by MICROMUSEO.

The permanent collection holds works from key Latin American movements and figures. From the 1950s and 1960s, the museum holds pieces by Gaston Garreaud, Rafael Hastings, Emilio Rodriguez Larraín, Oswaldo Vigas, and Fernando de Szyszlo. The 1990s expansion introduced works by geometric abstractionists Victor Pasmore and Eduardo Ramirez Villamizar, kinetic artists Jesus Rafael Soto and Carlos Cruz-Diez, conceptual artist Alvaro Barrios, and narrative figuration artists Antonio Segui and Herman Braun-Vega. Later additions include donations from national artists such as Ramiro Llona, Armando Varela, Fernando de Szyszlo, and Kukuli Velarde, alongside works from MICROMUSEO by Alfredo Marquez, Angel Valdez, Moico Yaker, Juan Javier Salazar, and Elliot Tupac.

The museum building was designed by Peruvian architect Frederick Cooper Llosa in a modernist style. It is situated on land donated in concession by the Municipality of Barranco, specifically in an area formerly occupied by the Barranco Zoo and lake, which closed in 1970. The structure rests atop the site of the former artificial lake, a location previously known for a highly publicized scandal involving a police raid on a restaurant named after the lake. The building is composed of three main modules corresponding to the rooms for the permanent collection and temporary exhibitions. Large windows overlook a water mirror, accentuating the concept of the museum as an island, and a large green area provides free public access.

MAC Lima is located in the Barranco District of Lima, Peru. It operates as a private non-profit organization under the management of the IAC. The museum's educational department approaches its collections and contemporary art not only from an aesthetic perspective but as tools for capacity development and humanistic formation. Its programs include MAC in the School, MAC Classroom, Free Classroom, Sundays at the MAC, and Courses. The museum has also focused its programming on issues of gender identity, feminism, and discrimination, notably defending its 2018 exhibition of Virgenes de la Puerta by Juan Jose Barboza-Gubo and Andrew Mroczek against public controversy and legislative attempts to criminalize religious defamation.