The new museum of Lisbon wants to be the hotspot of the city (exclusive images) – Express

The calm of the river Tagus and contrasts with the hustle and bustle in the margin. The front of the future MAAT-Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology, Lisbon, does not yet reflect the harmony that searches for the location, but nothing will prevent the inauguration Tuesday. The assurance that everything will be ready in time for opening is given, but António Mexia, CEO of EDP, is not assured.

There are sidewalk based, ceramic to put on the facade, and a lot of cleaning to do. Here works-if at cruising speed, always with attention to detail so that no hitch to delay the works. It is, according to Mexia, "the realization of a dream", which started when in that space, next to the Central Tejo, "there was a wall that separated the capital from the river".

we Start at the top, a roof "made for living" that will become one of the greatest viewpoints of the city. "It’s a unique view and panoramic of the riverfront, which allows you to see the mouth of the Tagus, the industrial zone and the city," says Mexia, ensuring that "all people may come here, even if they have never been to the museum". For the executive, the MAAT is not just a museum to visit, if it is "a museum of experiences with the goal of bringing more people to the culture, to architecture and to the technology, as well as for energy, that is everywhere". The exhibition space now has 4000 square meters, with Oval Gallery, where will be the installation site-specific by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster — and the Main Gallery to take themselves as the main halls of MAAT, to which join a Video Room and a Project Room.

But the new "hotspot of London", as Mexia likes to call it, is not limited to the building’s organic, "not very common in Portuguese architecture, characterized by straight lines", created by Amanda Levete. The area of intervention amounts to 38 thousand square metres, which includes the MAAT, but also the Central Tagus and the gardens (with the inauguration scheduled for 2017).

As to the position of the MAAT in the face of the world’s benchmarks, António Mexia is cautious, noting "the difference in scale", without that this prevents you from revealing that "will have a little of places such as the MoMA of New York, the Serpentine Gallery in London, or the HangarBicocca and the Pirelli, in Milan." It will be the same this is the secret, "have a little bit of this mixture that attracts people," and the establishment of partnerships with other institutions is another advantage in the construction of the programming. The idea is that these "can contribute to Lisbon is on the global circuit" of contemporary art. The executive brings to the world of the arts "a parallel with what happens in the world, where there is competition but there is also cooperation".

With an investment, "which represents 0.6% of the global total of the EDP in the last three years," the MAAT is a museum more open than most of the museum spaces and has in the breaking down of barriers one of its flags. "Fotografável, 'twittável' and communicable without restrictions", it opens to the public on Wednesday, with 12 hours of free programming.