The first art museum in Latin America, known at the time as the National Museum of Painting, was inaugurated on September 18, 1880, in downtown Santiago, Chile, in a classical building designed by French-Chilean architect Emile Jéquier to celebrate Chile's centenary.

Since then, this important cultural institution has acquired more than 3,000 works of art and 100,000 bibliographical volumes, forming the wonderful cultural heritage of this South American nation.