When the pandemic forced most museums to close their doors over the last year, many increased their efforts to meet patrons in the digital realm via virtual learning centers and online gallery tours. For the São Paulo Museum of Modern Art (MAM), this meant teaming up with the influential game Minecraft to create new avenues of exploration for patrons from all around the world.
Continuing to test the boundaries of Minecraft’s highly adaptable platform, the “MAM no Minecraft” initiative introduces unique challenges that help students and burgeoning artists learn about the many special features of the museum.
According to Cauê Alves, chief curator of MAM São Paulo, “Over the past year, MAM has been breaking its spatial boundaries through nontraditional exhibition formats. We expanded the performance of the museum beyond the walls that surround it and its surroundings; we took the works of the collection for exhibitions at bus stops and projections on facades of buildings; … we took products from the museum to the largest marketplace in the world through the online store. And now we take MAM into the Minecraft: Education Edition educational platform.”
Part challenge and part exploration, Minecraft’s infinite possibilities have long since opened the door to organizations and schools using it as an educational tool. Within the digital space, creators have managed to reimagine everything from lost cultural sites to pandemic simulations.
Created in partnership with Agência Africa, a Brazilian creative agency, a short video about “MAM no Minecraft” emphasizes the educational potential of the game alongside its accessible nature. Directed by Rog Souza and with narration by actor and Unicef goodwill ambassador Lazaro Ramos, the spot walks us through the wonders of the São Paulo MMA, illustrating how patrons can build and learn in new ways from the comfort of their own homes.
In the words of Sergio Gordilho, co-president and CCO of Agência Africa and museum board member, “Taking MAM into a platform as innovative as Minecraft, giving access to the collection for millions of people around the world, especially at a time when we have never been so digital and isolated, is the materialization of what it is to be more current, contemporary and modern.”
