While the Centre Pompidou in Paris is closed for refurbishment, those wishing to see its collection will have to go a little further afield: 10,000km south to the Brazilian border city of Iguaçu Falls.
This is where the French institution has signed its latest franchise deal, building a new satellite museum in the tourist-friendly Unesco World Heritage site.
Iguaçu Falls already attracts two million visitors to the Brazilian side of the giant waterfalls, 275 individual cascades that demarcate the borders of Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay. Coordinators of the deal hope that those visitor numbers will double in a deluge of cultural tourism.
The five-year deal marks the first outpost of the Pompidou in South America. Paraguayan architect Solano Benitez will build the 10,000m2 museum.
Pompidou is banking on such partnerships to bankroll the costly refurbishment of its Parisian headquarters, with an estimated €25m to €30m annual revenue (as per The Art Newspaper) as new sites are opened in Seoul in May 2026, Brussels in November 2026 and Jersey City in 2030. The Centre already operates museums in Malaga and Shanghai.
