El Museo del Barrio, often known simply as El Museo (the museum), is a museum at 1230 Fifth Avenue in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is located near the northern end of Fifth Avenue's Museum Mile, immediately north of the Museum of the City of New York. Founded in 1969, El Museo specializes in Latin American and Caribbean art, with an emphasis on works from Puerto Rico and the Puerto Rican community in New York City. It is the oldest museum of the country dedicated to Latino art. Collection The museum features an extensive permanent collection of over 6,500 pieces, and it encompasses more than 800 years of Puerto Rican, Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino art, includes pre-Columbian Taíno artifacts, traditional arts (such as Puerto Rican Santos de palo and Vejigante masks), twentieth-century drawings, paintings, sculptures and installations, as well as prints, photography, documentary films, and video. There are often temporary exhibits on Puerto Rican and Latino modern art. The museum also sponsors numerous festivals and educational programs throughout the year including the annual Three Kings Day parade. Due to a lack of space prior to their 2009-2010 expansion, the museum began to place some of their permanent collection online. This also served as a means of audience development. Seeking to increase their audience and reach new audiences, El Museo has partnered with a number of organizations for joint exhibits including Nueva York (New York Historical Society) and Caribbean Crossroads (Queens Museum of Art and the Studio Museum in Harlem). Also, the museum is currently working on building its permanent collection by developing their holdings on Post-War art, adding more Modernist and Contemporary works, and fostering the strengths of graphics and Taíno holdings. History Originally, the museum was a fire station during the Nuyorican Movement and Civil Rights Movement, where books were burned by radical political figures. Spurred by concerns over a lack of cultural diversity in city educational programs and educational opportunities in the barrio, a group of African-American and Puerto Rican parents, educators and community activists in Central and East Harlem, also known as El Barrio, demanded for their kids to receive education that acknowledged and addressed their diverse and cultural heritages. In response to these demands, William W. Frey, the superintendent of school district 4, appointed artist/educator Rafael Montañez Ortíz to create materials for schools in East and Central Harlem that would highlight Puerto Rican art,