This museum is housed on the second floor of a former military barracks, about one block from the fort “El Morro.”Each room houses a different medium of art, related to various aspects of the local culture. The cost of a senior entrance fee is $4 and you get a wristband that allows you to leave and reenter the same day. There are closed for lunch.

The museum has eight halls for exhibitions, but only five were open during my visit. They did offer quite diverse themes. The most impressive, in my view, was the exhibition on indigenous peoples in Latin America. Felipe Lettersten had a short, but very productive life. His authentic bronze sculptures and accompanying short texts in Spanish and English took me through a fascinating journey through indigenous cultures. In another hall, colorful paintings provided plesant visual entertainment of a more shallow nature. The museum was closed on Mondays and Tuesday at the time I visited San Juan. They also close for lunch, so check before you go.

A great museum - just bummed that so much of it was closed while we were there. Of course I wish the conquistadors had not come and taken over, forcing their culture, language, and religion on the indigenous people. I love that this museum touched on that, and did not shy away from that, but also showed the results of the transculturation in a process that, as explained by exhibits at the museum, is apparently called syncretism. And some of the results are fascinating and beautiful, in the folk art and contemporary art. I am no longer much of a scholar, but I think this museum did a good job tacking difficult subjects. The very last exhibit in the last hall on femicide will break your heart though, so be prepared.

Although it’s a large, 2-storey building with rooms all around a large central courtyard, only 4 galleries were open, and really what was on display was nothing more than the folk art collection. Although they have vastly narrowed what is on display, this is definitely a museum any art-lover should visit in San Juan, although I would not call it a historical museum. The best gallery showcased the works of one artist who took the wooden shutters off old mansions before they were demolished. He then put fused glass on them to make various designs. It’s really great, and about the only preservation that was done before the mansions were demolished. Another gallery has all kinds of cards on the walls and in cases from a local painter that he sent to his son while he was travelling the world. It’s a brilliant concept, and the gallery contains their correspondence from his son's youth into adulthood. The other two open rooms are more general in nature. There are displays of pottery, native cosutmes, religious stuff and carnival masks. Toss in a bit of history of post-colonial Puerto Rico, and there you have it.