This Banco de la República art complex is a bastion of Colombian creativity with three museums linked by lush courtyards. You’ll find 800 works chronicling national history from the 15th to 21st centuries, thousands of numismatic objects like hand-cut coins and banknotes, a treasure chest of European Impressionism and 123 voluptuous pieces by Colombian art king Fernando Botero.
Museo de Arte Miguel Urrutia
Time travel through Colombian history in 16 galleries at the Museo de Arte Miguel Urrutia (MAMU). Don’t miss La custodia de la Iglesia de San Ignacio de Bogotá (Gallery 2), an 18th-century cross sculpted with 1485 emeralds, and Alejandro Obregón’s Violencia (Gallery 7), invoking the hopelessness Obregón felt for war-ravaged Colombia in the 1960s.
Museo Casa de Moneda
The Colección Numismática, housed in the Museo Casa de Moneda, isn’t all shiny stuff, though there’s no shortage of coins here. Murals throughout connect the evolution of indigenous beliefs, Christianity and politics to Colombian dinero. Start in the northwest, 1st-floor corner.
Museo Botero
Don’t call them fat. The zaftig paintings by Medellín-born Fernando Botero (1932–2023) are more concerned with the impact of volume and "sensuality of form," as he liked to say. Wander this 1950s reconstruction of an 18th-century villa to admire the colorful collection he donated in 2000.
In the east wing, scope 85 works by beloved Europeans (Klimt, Picasso etc). The west wing is all Botero. Look for Colombian icons (armed guerillas, fleet-footed dancers), reimagined classics (Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, Van Gogh’s sunflowers) plus his inimitable sculptures. It’s nearly impossible to miss his Left Hand (1932) waving near the Calle 11 entrance.
