Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art

The Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, commonly known as MIMA, is a contemporary art gallery located in the centre of Middlesbrough, England. Formally launched on Sunday, 27 January 2007, it has formed part of Teesside University since 2014. The institution houses approximately 2,500 works and serves as a significant cultural anchor for this post-industrial town in the northeast of England.

The gallery's opening represented the culmination of a long and fragmented history of art provision in Middlesbrough. The town's early artistic heritage drew partly on the Linthorpe Art Pottery (1879-1889), co-founded by Christopher Dresser. A School of Art opened alongside the Mechanics' Institute in Durham Street in 1870, later relocating to Linthorpe by the 1950s. The region also benefited from the Cleveland International Drawing Biennale until that competition ended in the 1990s. A site for the town's first art gallery was granted in 1904 by the father of Mayor Sir Arthur Dorman, on Linthorpe Road opposite what became the Dorman Museum, but funding shortfalls and the onset of war meant only a rest garden was built. From 1927, the Carnegie library and Grange Road Methodist Church housed the painting collection. No permanent gallery materialised until 1957, when the Council purchased a former doctor's surgery on Linthorpe Road; this building was not vacated until 2003. The former Cleveland Crafts Centre on Gilkes Street, which held twentieth-century British studio ceramics and artist-made jewellery from the 1970s onwards, closed as an exhibition venue in January 2003 and served as MIMA offices during construction. Its counterpart, the Cleveland Gallery, operated in unused school buildings on Victoria Road until 1999. Construction of the present gallery, designed by Erick van Egeraat Associated Architect, began in 2004 following the January 2003 closure of the two surviving galleries. During this period, MIMA programmed offsite exhibitions featuring artists including John Harrison and Paul Wood, Susan Pietzsch, Yuka Oyama, Graham Dolphin, Chicks on Speed, Martin Creed, Oliver Zwink and Mah Rana. Godfrey Worsdale served as founding director until 2008, when he became director of the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. Kate Brindley followed, then Mark Robinson as acting director during the transition from local authority to university ownership. Alistair Hudson, previously Deputy Director at Grizedale Arts, directed from 2014 until 2017, when he left for the Manchester Art Gallery and the Whitworth. The current director is Laura Sillars, formerly of Sheffield's Site Gallery. MIMA has participated in the Tate's Artist Rooms programme, presenting exhibitions by Gerhard Richter, Jannis Kounellis and Louise Bourgeois. In November 2009, the BBC Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May held an automotive art exhibition at the gallery, featured in the 14th series of the programme, which set an all-time attendance record for the institution.

The Middlesbrough Collection spans outstanding fine and applied art from the nineteenth century to the present day. Many pieces were acquired by MIMA's predecessors, the Middlesbrough Art Gallery and the Cleveland Craft Centre. The collection encompasses painting, sculpture, ceramics and other media, reflecting both regional cultural history and broader developments in British and international art. In 2015, Tees Valley Arts donated a significant body of work to the gallery as the Tees Valley Arts Collection, adding works by Vivan Sundaram, Len Tabner and Adrian Wiszniewski.

The collection includes works by Frank Auerbach, Elizabeth Blackadder, David Bomberg, Ken Currie, Jeremy Deller, Tracey Emin, Sir Jacob Epstein, Dame Elisabeth Frink, James Walter Gozzard, David Hockney, Peter Howson, Gwen John, Panayiotis Kalorkoti, L.S. Lowry, Ben Nicholson, Eduardo Paolozzi, Adrian Piper, Katherine Pleydell-Bouverie, Anne Redpath, Paula Rego, David Remfry, Lucie Rie, Stanley Spencer, Nancy Spero and Kara Walker.

The gallery occupies a purpose-built centre at Centre Square in Middlesbrough. Designed by Erick van Egeraat Associated Architect, the building opened in 2007 and comprises gallery spaces, an education suite, auditorium, café-bar, shop, roof terrace, collection stores and conservation studio. The structure replaced earlier, inadequate premises and represented a major investment in cultural infrastructure for the town.

MIMA is situated in the centre of Middlesbrough, England, at Centre Square. Since 2014, the institution has been part of Teesside University, marking a shift from local authority ownership to an academic partnership. The gallery maintains an official website at visitmima.com.