Sao Paulo Museum of Art. The São Paulo Museum of Art is an art museum located on Paulista Avenue in the city of São Paulo, Brazil. It is well known for its headquarters, a 1968 concrete and glass structure designed by Lina Bo Bardi, whose main body is supported by two lateral beams over a 74 metres freestanding space, considered a landmark of the city and a main symbol of modern Brazilian architecture. The museum is a private non-profit institution founded in 1947 by Assis Chateaubriand and Pietro Maria Bardi. MASP distinguished itself for many important initiatives concerning museology and art education in Brazil, as well as for its pioneering role as a cultural center. It was also the first Brazilian museum interested in Post-World War II art. The museum is internationally recognized for its collection of European art, considered the finest in Latin America and all Southern Hemisphere. It also houses an emphatic assemblage of Brazilian art, prints and drawings, as well as smaller collections of African and Asian art, antiquities, decorative arts, and others, amounting to more than 8,000 pieces. MASP also has one of the largest art libraries in the country. The entire collection has been named by Brazil's Institute of History and Art to the Brazilian National Heritage list. At the end of the 1940s, Brazilian economy was passing through large structural changes, consolidating the transition from an era dependent on coffee cycle to one of growing industrialization. The state of São Paulo specifically was attracting many industries and workers from many regions of the country and the world, and the city of São Paulo, in particular, had established itself as the most important industrial hub in the country. Regarding the artistic life, however, São Paulo's most notable reference was still the Week of Modern Art of 1922. Despite the importance this event had enjoyed in the 1920s, Modernism wouldn't draw much attention of city dwellers and institutions in the following decades. There was only one art museum in São Paulo, the Pinacoteca do Estado, solely devoted to Academic art, besides a commercial gallery. Assis Chateaubriand, founder and owner of Diários Associados, or Associated Daily Press, the largest media and press conglomerate of Brazil at the time, was one of the most influential individuals of this period. Jockingly nicknamed King of Brazil, he was a very active partaker in the national moves toward modernization. Backed by the power of his press conglomerate, Chateaubriand used to pressure Brazilian political and economical elite to help him in his public campaigns. In the mid-1940s, Chateaubriand created the Campanha da Aviação, which consisted of vigorous fundraising to acquire training aircraft, at the aim of endowing the country with a proper aviation system. As a result, more than one thousand aircraft were donated to Brazilian aviation schools. After the end of the Campanha da Aviação, Chateaubriand would start a new campaign, with the boldly intent of acquiring masterpieces to form an art collection of international standard in Brazil. He intended to host the museum in Rio de Janeiro, but chose São Paulo where he believed it would be easier to gather the necessary funds, since this city was enjoying a very prosperous moment. At the same time, the European art market had been deeply influenced by the end of World War II, making it possible to acquire fine artworks for reasonable prices. Chateaubriand would need the help of an expert in the selection of the artworks. With that purpose, he invited Pietro Maria Bardi, an Italian professor, critic and art dealer, former owner of galleries in Milan and Rome, to help him create a Museum of Classical and Modern Art. Bardi objected that there shouldn't be distinctions among arts, proposing simply a Museum of Art, and accepted the invitation. Planning to lead the project for only a year, Bardi would dedicate the rest of his life to it. He moved to Brazil together with his wife, the architect Lina Bo Bardi, and brought along his library and his private art collection. The museum was inaugurated and opened to public visitation on October 2, 1947, displaying the first acquisitions, amongst which canvases by Picasso and Rembrandt. In these first years of activity, the museum was located on the first floor of the Diarios Associados headquarters. Lina Bo Bardi was in charge of adapting the building to the needs of the museum, dividing it into four distinct areas: art gallery, a didactic exposition room about history of art, temporary exhibition room and an auditorium. MASP was the first Brazilian institution interested in acquiring works of modern art.