LIMA ART MUSEUM

CIVIC, CULTURAL

Client The Lima Art Museum (MALI)
Location Lima, Peru
Program Contemporary art museum extension, café, research library, offices
Area 6,000 m² / 64,584 ft²
Status Competition

With low-slung cantenary canopies, the new extension of the Museo de Arte de Lima (MALI) activates and frames the existing neo-classical ensemble. This proposed contemporary art wing is conceived as a delicate and deferential intervention to the institution’s historic campus. Two intersecting canopies float over a series of intimate galleries and classrooms that disperse and flock in plan. Entered from the north or south, the new wing is experienced as a single cavernous space excavated below grade.

PRESERVING THE EXISTING FACADE WHILE DEFINING ENTRACES

The canopies’ draped cantenaries establish a formal relationship with the existing Palacio de la Exposición, echoing the museum’s covered internal courtyard while complementing the harmonics in its neo-classical façade. The design optimizes the canopies to preserve views of the existing western façade while defining entrances to the east for the the existing Palacio de la Exposición and to the south for the Parque de la Exposición.