A former mall in central Russia is being converted into a museum as part of a larger $2 billion development project that will give the isolated Siberian city of Norilsk what could potentially be the northernmost contemporary arts facility in the world. 

Images have been unveiled for the new Arctic Museum of Modern Art (AMMA), a new $40 million institution that will give new life to a defunct mall thanks to a city-wide cultural renewal initiative funded by a local nickel-producing magnate.

Russian architect Ilya Mukosey is behind the 8,500 square meter design meant as a new home for the collection of mostly regional art put together by Nornickel. The new museum will feature added exhibitions spaces, open storage, and a new above-ground entrance not common to the closed Arctic city. Mukosey is the creative director of a Russian-language online magazine Artplay Today and has his own practice founded in Moscow in 2019. 

AMMA will be joined by another museum called MAMA as well as existing institution to be restored as part of a new entity called the Norilsk Museum Complex made possible by the oft-investigated company.

"We have a unique opportunity to make Norilsk a city of the future,” Nornickel Senior VP Larisa Zelkova told Russian news agency TASS. “It is impossible to imagine it without a substantial cultural context, which must be created by the expressive and modern social spaces like the AMMA.” 

Average temperatures in Norilsk hover between 0° and -9° in the winter and rarely crack 65° even in the hottest months. The city is host to about 180,000 residents and is one of only two cities with six-figure populations situated on top a permafrost zone. 

The museum is expected to open in 2025.