Rooseum was founded in 1988 by art collector Fredrik Roos as an art gallery of international class for contemporary Nordic art in Scandinavia. Five nationally and internationally-attended exhibitions were conducted before the business hit a financial crisis in connection with Fredrik Roos' death in 1991. In January 1992, the Rooseum Foundation was formed with Malmö City, Lill and Axel Roos and Louisiana Museum of Modern Art as Principals. In 2006, the Foundation's Rooseum ceased operations in the art gallery, but the foundation remained a long time for administrative and financial commitments. Nowadays, the foundation Rooseum is unregistered as foundation. Rooseum was taken over by the municipality and Malmö City sent a request to the Modern Museum in Stockholm to establish another modern museum in the premises. A collaboration between Malmö city, Region Skåne and the Swedish state resulted in the Modern Museum Malmö being opened in 2009 in the Rooseum property.