SOUTHEAST BRAZIL - Brazil - page 68

Museu de Arte
Moderna q
Av Infante Dom Henrique 85,
Centro. Map 5 F5. Tel [phone]
4944. noon-6pm

Tue-Fri, noon-7pm Sat, Sun & public
hols.

q Cinelândia. #

& 8 7 www .mamrio.org.br

Rio's Modern Art Museum
(MAM) has one of the best
collections of 20th-century
art in Brazil, surpassed only
by MASP in São Paulo (see
p143) . The museum also
houses one of the largest
archives of Brazilian films.
The strikingly modern
building that houses the MAM
was far ahead of its time in its
design and architecture when
it was built in 1958. In 1978,
a major fire destroyed many
of its irreplaceable exhibits,
including the works of Miró,
Picasso, Salvador Dalí, Max
Ernst, and René Magritte. It
has taken time and the
generosity of collectors in
Brazil and abroad to rebuild
the collection. Today, the
MAM is once more a highly
regarded institution, not only
for its own archive but also
for the visiting exhibitions
from around the world that it
stages through the year.
Located close to its gardens
is a monument to the victims
of World War II. Inaugurated
in 1960, it represents two
arms raised with hands out-
stretched in prayer. In 1980,
Pope John Paul II said mass
from the steps of the monu-
ment to a crowd of more than
2 million people. Below the
monument is a museum
describing Brazil's partici-
pation in the Allied oper-
ations, known as the Italian
Campaign, in and around
Italy between 1944 and 1945.

A Batalha do Avaí (1877) by Pedro Américo, Museu Nacional de Belas Artes

Museu Nacional de
Belas Artes 9
Av Rio Branco 199, Centro.
Map 5 E4. Tel [phone].

Museu Histórico
Nacional 0
Praça Marechal Âncora. Map 5 F4.
Tel [phone]. q q Cinelândia.

Cinelândia. 10am-6pm Tue-Fri, 2-

6pm Sat, Sun & public hols.

# # 10am-5:30pm Tue-Fri, 2-6pm

Sat, Sun & public hols.

& free & 8

on Sun. 8 7 www .mnba.gov.br 7 restricted. www .

museuhistoriconacional.com.br

The National Museum of
Fine Arts is one of the most
important permanent art
collections in Latin America.
The building in which it is
housed dates from 1908.
The collection, which has
over 16,000 pieces in its
archive, features Brazilian
artists from the colonial
period as well as from
the 19th and 20th cen-
turies. Artists include
Frans Post, who painted
Brazilian landscapes in
classical Dutch style,
the Frenchman Jean
Baptiste Debret, who
painted the immortal
Battle of Guararapes
(1879), Vitor
Meireles, and Pedro
Américo, whose A Batalha
do Avaí (1877) is one of the
largest paintings in the world
painted on an easel. There
is also a gallery for contem-
porary exhibits.
The gallery has an extensive
collection of non-Brazilian
works and a particularly fine
selection of Baroque Italian
art dating from the 17th and
18th centuries. The museum
was created on the basis of a
prized art collection, brought
to Brazil from Europe by
Portugal's King Dom João VI
and his court when they fled
Napoleon in 1808 (see p52) .

Founded in 1922, the
country's leading history
museum recounts the history
of Brazil up to 1889. Its
collection of 287,000
pieces includes everything
from paintings and coins
to carriages and rarities
such as the pen used by
Princess Isabel to sign
the decree abolishing
slavery. Apart from dis-
playing period furniture,
19th-century firearms,
and locomotives, the
museum also traces
Brazil's colonial past
in its charts and
written declarations.
The building is
one of the oldest
in Rio, with a portion belong-
ing to Santiago Fort, dating
from 1603.

Sculpture, Museu
Nacional de Belas
Artes

Entrance to the Museu de Arte Moderna (MAM)

For hotels and restaurants in this region see pp366-9 and pp394-6