Photo: Jorge · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

Museu Municipal de Esposende

Polynuclear municipal museum, housed since 1993 in the Teatro Club building in Esposende, with ethnography and contemporary art collections; closed for works.

Temporarily closed

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Temporarily closed. The museum is closed to the public for requalification works; no reopening date has been announced.

About the museum

The Museu Municipal de Esposende is based in the Teatro Club de Esposende, a building from 1911 designed by the architect Miguel Ventura Terra. It opened to the public as a museum in 1993, after adaptation works directed by the architect Bernardo Ferrão. In 2005 and 2012 there were interventions in the interiors that improved the physical accessibility of the reception, the shop, the exhibition rooms, the storage and the documentation centre.

The museum programme was revised in 2000, and the museum became polynuclear, with its seat in the former theatre and units in other places in the municipality. The first was the Museu d'Arte, in Fão, which operated between 2000 and 2010. In 2012 the museum reformulated its programme: the archaeology collection was transferred to the municipality's cultural heritage service, and the ethnography and contemporary art collections remained. The Rede de Museus do Mar de Esposende (Esposende Sea Museums Network) was also created, later joined by the Museu Marítimo.

The ethnography collection shows the maritime, rural and urban world of the municipality, from fishing and shipbuilding to agriculture and costumes. The contemporary art collection brings together painting, sculpture, photography and tapestry by local artists. The museum is part of the Rede Portuguesa de Museus (Portuguese Museum Network) and coordinates the Rede de Museus de Esposende. It is currently closed to the public for requalification works.