Masp MASP: a museum in the country of audacious ideas The idea of the creation of the most important museum in Latin America started to become reality when Assis Chateaubriand, lawyer, journalist and businessman, the owner of a chain of newspapers, magazines and radio stations, meets Pietro Maria Bardi, an Italian art dealer who had just arrived in Rio de Janeiro. This was also the beginning of a history of success and idealism. It was 1946. Bardi had organized an exposition of Italian paintings which was receiving the visit of Chateaubriand. They were introduced to each other and, in the same evening, the businessman, know at that time as "the king of communication", commented the desire to create a museum of art in Brazil. Some days later, in a dinner offered by Chateubriand, he invites Bardi to direct the museum. One of the only divergence in the partnership that begun that evening happened about the name of the museum: Museum of Antique and Modern Art chosen by Chateaubriand, and Museum of Art chosen by Bardi. Saying that "there is only one art", Bardi owns. And MASP was created. They decide the museum will be in São Paulo city which is leaving at that time the prosperity of coffee trading. The building that would house the headquarters of Diários Associados, Chateaubriand's main newspaper, is being built and they have the idea of using one of its floors for the museum. In a visit to the construction, Chateaubriand introduces Bardi to his staff: "Here, on this floors, we will install a museum. This is Professor Bardi, its director". Bardi will carry the title conquered in that afternoon for the rest of his days. The inauguration of the Museum of Art of São Paulo, MASP, occurs on October 2, 1947. Lina is, since the very first day, in charge for the architectural project of the institution that, in the beginning, is installed in an area of 1000m2 on the second floor of the building of Diários Associados, on 7 de Abril street, downtown in São Paulo. The collection still did not count with many pieces and there were two temporary expositions: a Series based on the Bible, by Cândido Portinari and another one presenting the paintings of Ernesto Fiori, an Italian artist. The goal was to consummate periodic expositions, promoting the didactic aspects of art in courses and conferences and also open schools about themes not discussed before. Bardi wanted to create a "live museum" and Brazil was the perfect scenery for that objective: "I come from Europe and there, the museums are installed in historical buildings. When they are built, people have the sadist intention of making dead buildings to house dead objects. Therefore, in my opinion, the Americans were the first to truly understand the educational function of the new museums. The Museum of Art of São Paulo will also be one of them. It seems that, in Brazil, we just realize that audacious ideas are not utopia, while, on the contrary, an example that Bardi achieved what he planned was the success of all the schools that integrated the MASP: engraving, painting, industrial design, sculpture, ecology, photography, cinema, gardening, theater, dance and even fashion design. To compose the historical paintings collection, Bardi, already a Brazilian citizen, travelled back to Europe, at that time, destroyed by the War, to search for pieces of art. Supported by the wealth of Chateaubriand by his own expertise in arts. From 1947 trough 1953, he acquired precious pieces paying low prices, as all the 73 bronze sculptures by Degas, for which he paid US$ 45 thousand - nowadays, only one of the pieces, The Ballet Dancer, is worth US$ 400 thousand not to mention Diego Velásquez's Count-Duke of Olivares and The Student, by Van Gogh, bought for US$ 40 mil each and worth US$ 30 million. Among the almost 4 thousand pieces that form the museum's collection, there are also paintings of Renoir, Rafael, Goya, Gauguin, Ticiano, Picasso, Modigliani, Lucas Cranach Cèzanne and many others. . continue

P.M. Bardi at MASP, 1986 Juvenal Pereira