You’re looking for a building on your right with tall silver-gray walls, vertical lines of leafy vines climbing up from the sidewalk, and a large, metal folding gate-almost hidden behind a green curtain of plants.
Welcome to Galería OMR! If you ever wanted to see brutalist architecture try to dress up in nature’s best green jacket, you’re looking at it-concrete toughness softened by those lush, climbing plants. But besides being photogenic, this spot has been shaking up Mexico City’s art world since 1983.
OMR was dreamed up by Patricia Ortiz Monasterio and Jaime Riestra at a time when contemporary art galleries were pretty rare in Mexico. Picture the 80s: big hair, bold fashion, and a city buzzing with change. The gallery started out in an old early-20th century house on Plaza Río de Janeiro. If those walls could talk, wow, would they tell stories-of wild installations, famous artists pacing the creaky floorboards, and maybe even a confused cat or two ducking behind sculptures.
By 2009, OMR didn’t just stand still. It added a project space next door called el52-aptly named because, well, it’s on number 52. This was a new playground where young artists could go big, get weird, and make art that simply wouldn’t fit in a traditional gallery.
Then came 2016, a year of rebirth. The gallery packed up its art and moved here, to this address on Córdoba. Imagine the tension-new building, new era, and new challenges as Patricia and Jaime’s son, Cristóbal Riestra, officially took the director’s chair. The architects kept the bold bones of the original brutalist structure: the heavy concrete roof balanced by just four chunky columns, a giant skylight spilling daylight onto the exhibits, and floors that played hopscotch with your feet-until they were leveled out for the new space.
They built a patio, warehouse, garden bar, reception, and even snuck in a terrace and library up top. OMR became a kind of castle for contemporary art, but one where everyone is invited to see the magic.
Inside, you’d find big names and rising stars-shows like Jorge Méndez Blake’s “View of Southwest Window,” Maruch Santíz Gómez’s “Creencias II,” and legendary works by James Turrell. They haven’t just stayed put either; OMR is a regular at mega fairs like Zona MACO and Art Basel in Basel, Miami, and Hong Kong. If art had a passport, OMR’s would have more stamps than most travel bloggers.
So, as you stand in front of these mysterious walls, know you’re outside one of the world’s most influential art labs, a secret garden for creativity where young ideas have a very old home, and where every show is a new adventure. And hey, if you spot someone going in with wild hair and a slightly worried expression, it might just be the next big thing in art-or maybe just someone who forgot their umbrella.
Ready to delve deeper into the location, architecture or the exhibitions (from 2011)? Join me in the chat section for an enriching discussion.
