COSTANTINI ACQUIRES THE DAROS LATINAMERICA COLLECTION AS PART OF MALBA’S STRATEGIC EXPANSION
In a historic operation that nearly doubles its holdings of modern and contemporary Latin American art, the museum moves forward with the expansion of its headquarters and consolidates its position as one of the region’s leading international institutions.
Looking ahead to the museum’s 25th anniversary, to be celebrated in September 2026, Malba announces that its founder, Eduardo F. Costantini, has acquired the Daros Latinamerica Collection, comprising 1,233 works by 117 artists from the region, primarily produced between the 1950s and the 2010s. With this acquisition, the modern and contemporary Latin American art collection of Malba and Eduardo Costantini will nearly double in size, becoming one of the largest and most important in the world, with approximately 3,000 works.
This unprecedented acquisition is part of Malba’s strategic expansion, which includes enlarging the museum building beneath the plaza adjacent to the institution, with the aim of adding new exhibition spaces for its constantly growing collection and temporary exhibitions. The new construction will double the museum’s current surface area, reaching approximately 8,000 square meters.
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Hélio Oiticica. Relevo espacial, 1959. Cortesía de Malba
In the words of Eduardo F. Costantini: “The incorporation of the Daros Latinamerica Collection is an immense joy and a historic step in Malba’s sustained growth. Adding major contemporary works to the masterpieces already in the collection, and being able to project the museum’s leap in scale as it approaches its 25th anniversary, is a dream come true.”
The Daros Latinamerica Collection was established in 2000 by Ruth Schmidheiny together with her then husband, Swiss entrepreneur and philanthropist Stephan Schmidheiny. Its acquisition is of enormous importance for the museum, as it substantially strengthens its contemporary holdings. It also marks the return of highly significant Latin American works to the region, after having been part of a collection based in Zurich, Switzerland.
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Cildo Meireles. Missão-Missões (Como construir catedrais), 1987. Cortesía de Malba
Malba assumes the responsibility of preserving and publicly reactivating this outstanding body of work, with the aim of making it accessible once again to audiences and reinforcing its commitment to the dissemination of Latin American art. The 1,233 new works join a stellar constellation of modern masterpieces from the Malba and Costantini Collection by artists such as Tarsila do Amaral, Frida Kahlo, Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo, Diego Rivera, Joaquín Torres García, Wifredo Lam, Roberto Matta, Cándido Portinari, Emiliano Di Cavalcanti, and Antonio Berni, among many others.
The acquisition consolidates Malba’s holdings in key periods and artistic movements already represented in the collection—such as geometric abstraction, New Figuration, and conceptual art—while also incorporating iconic works by fundamental Latin American artists not previously represented. Significant groups of works by historical figures such as Julio Le Parc, Lygia Clark, Gego, Antonio Dias, Maria Freire, Liliana Porter, Mira Schendel, and Luis Camnitzer will enter the collection, alongside works such as Relevo espacial (1959) by Hélio Oiticica; Analogía I (1971) by Víctor Grippo; Untitled (Glass on Body Imprints) (1972) by Ana Mendieta; Missão/Missões (Como construir catedrais) (1987) by Cildo Meireles; and La cena (1993) by Belkis Ayón. Emblematic works by Doris Salcedo from the 1990s and 2000s mark the artist’s first inclusion in the museum’s collection, alongside iconic pieces by Carlos Cruz-Diez, such as Fisicromía 2 (1959), and a group of early works by Jesús Rafael Soto. These latter artists represent just three of a total of 75 artists entering the Malba and Eduardo Costantini collections for the first time.
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Tania Bruguera. Destierro, 1998. Cortesía de Malba
The Daros Latinamerica Collection will significantly expand the museum’s representation of photography, video, and installation, with works by Ana Mendieta, Rosângela Rennó, Paz Errázuriz, Marcos López, José Alejandro Restrepo, Alfredo Jaar, Javier Tellez, and Melanie Smith. The extraordinary groups of works by artists such as Julio Le Parc, Liliana Porter, Luis Camnitzer, Guillermo Kuitca, Luis Benedit, and Waltercio Caldas, among others, will make it possible to organize major panoramic exhibitions, turning this collection into a fundamental resource for research.
This incorporation also significantly broadens the geographic scope of the museum’s collection, deepening the representation of countries such as Colombia and Cuba—already present in the museum’s holdings, but now joining Argentina, Mexico, and Brazil as the most strongly represented nations—while also extending to countries such as Costa Rica, Honduras, Jamaica, Panama, and the Dominican Republic.
About the Daros Latinamerica Collection
Based in Zurich, the Daros Latinamerica Collection was founded in 2000 by Swiss collector Ruth Schmidheiny together with her then husband, Stephan Schmidheiny. The collection was established independently from the Daros Collection in order to allow each initiative to develop autonomously. The Daros Collection is the private collection of the Schmidheiny family, founded in 1997 and focused on North American and European art from the second half of the twentieth century. Over more than two decades, it has become one of the most comprehensive and significant private collections of contemporary Latin American art.
The Stephan Schmidheiny family welcomes the return of the collection to Latin America and its establishment at Malba.
*Cover image: courtesy of Malba.
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