Pérez Art Museum Miami opens on Biscayne Bay

Pérez Art Museum Miami has opened its new waterfront building, beginning a major chapter for the institution formerly known as Miami Art Museum. The December 4 opening places modern and contemporary art in a Herzog & de Meuron-designed home at Museum Park.

The move changes the museum’s visibility as well as its address. A waterfront building can become a destination in its own right, but the institution’s continuing significance will depend on the exhibitions, collections and public programs it makes possible. Architecture supplies an invitation; the museum must give visitors reasons to return.

The opening also arrives at a useful moment for thinking about Miami’s cultural identity. International art attention is concentrated here each December, while a museum operates on a different timescale. PAMM’s new home gives the city a substantial year-round platform for that work, with the bay now part of the experience of encountering art.