Art museum

An art museum, or art gallery, is a special place where people can see beautiful and interesting pieces of art. These museums usually have their own collection of art pieces that they show in buildings or spaces made just for displaying art. Some art museums are open to everyone, while others might have special rules about who can visit.

Art museums focus mostly on visual art, like paintings, sculptures, and drawings, but they also do many other fun things. You might find lectures, jewelry shows, performances, music concerts, or poetry readings happening there too. These museums often change their displays with new exhibitions. Sometimes, they borrow art from other museums to create special shows just for a certain time.

Terminology

See also: Art gallery § Art museums versus galleries

Places where art is shown can be called an art museum or an art gallery. These words mean the same thing. Many famous places around the world are called either a gallery or a museum. Some are called galleries, like the National Gallery in London and the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin. Others are called museums, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, and the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo.

Sometimes, the word "art gallery" is used for shops that sell art, but these are not the same as art museums.

History

Private collections

Important and expensive art pieces were often made for religious institutions or leaders and shown in temples, churches, and palaces. Some people were allowed to see these art collections, even though they were not open to everyone. In ancient times, religious places acted like early art galleries. Wealthy people in Rome, like Julius Caesar, sometimes gave their special items to temples, but it is not clear how easy it was for people to see them.

In Europe, from the Late Medieval period onward, parts of royal palaces, castles, and big homes of rich families were sometimes open to certain people. At the Palace of Versailles, only people of certain social classes could enter, and they had to wear special clothes. Treasuries in cathedrals and big churches were sometimes shown to the public. Many grand English country houses allowed visitors to tour for a small gift to the housekeeper when the family was away.

Special arrangements let the public see royal or private art collections in galleries. For example, most paintings from the Orleans Collection were in a wing of the Palais-Royal in Paris and could be visited during most of the 1700s. In Italy, the Grand Tour became popular in the 1700s, and cities worked to show their important art. The Capitoline Museums started in 1471 when classical sculptures were given to Rome by the Papacy. The Vatican Museums began in 1506 with the display of the Laocoön and His Sons. The Green Vault in the Kingdom of Saxony opened to the public in the 1720s.

Privately funded museums open to the public started in the 1600s, often from collections of curious items. The first was the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, opened in 1683 to show artefacts given to Oxford University.

Public museums

The Kunstmuseum Basel is thought to be the first art museum open to the public, starting from the Amerbach Cabinet in 1661. In the late 1700s, many private art collections opened to the public. After the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars, many royal collections became public, even where kings still ruled, like in Spain and Bavaria.

In 1753, the British Museum was created, and manuscripts were given to it for public viewing. In 1777, there was a plan to buy a large art collection and put it in the British Museum, but it was too expensive. Later, the collection went to Russia and became part of the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg.

The Bavarian royal collection opened to the public in 1779, and the Medici collection in Florence around 1789. The Musée du Louvre opened in 1793 during the French Revolution, showing much of the former French royal collection. The building now the Prado in Madrid was built before the French Revolution to show parts of the royal collection. In Great Britain, the first national art galleries were the Dulwich Picture Gallery, founded in 1814, and the National Gallery, London, opened in 1824. The National Gallery in Prague was created in 1796 by Czech aristocrats.

The Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. is considered the first art museum in the United States. It was originally in the Renwick Gallery, built in 1859 and finished in 1874. It held American and European art and was designed to look like the Louvre's Tuileries addition.

University museums and galleries

See also: University art museums and galleries in the United States

University art museums and galleries are collections of art owned and cared for by schools and universities. This practice exists all over the world. There are over 700 university art museums in the US alone, making them perhaps the largest group of art museums in the country. These collections started in art academies in Western Europe but are now found in many types of higher education centers.

Galleries as a specific section in museums

The word gallery originally described a type of room. In museums, display rooms are often called public galleries. Sometimes, a group of rooms focused on a specific time period, like Ancient Egypt, or a special theme, such as a collection of plaster casts like in the Ashmolean Museum, are called specific galleries, for example, Egyptian Gallery or Cast Gallery.

Visual art not shown in a gallery

Some types of art, like drawings, pastels, watercolors, prints, and photographs, are not shown all the time to keep them safe. Visitors can see them in a special room called a print room. Other artworks, such as murals and mosaics, often stay where they were made, though some have been moved to galleries. Art from the 1900s, like land art and performance art, is usually found outside of galleries, but photos of these works might be shown inside.

Many museums have more art pieces than they can display at once, so the extra pieces are kept in reserve collections, either inside or outside the main building. A sculpture garden is an outdoor gallery where sculptures are shown in open spaces, and sculptures are becoming more popular to see both permanently and temporarily.

Architecture

Many big paintings made around 1530 were shown in churches or palaces. Today, many of these palaces are art museums. By the 1700s, some new buildings were made just to show art. They had special rooms for pictures and lights from above.

In the late 1800s, many cities in Europe and America built public art galleries. These became important places for culture and learning. In the 1900s, the way these buildings were designed changed. Newer styles replaced older ones. Some people think these new designs can sometimes make it harder to enjoy the art inside.

Cultural aspects

Art museums do more than just show paintings and sculptures. They help shape our identity and memories. Many art museums were built for important reasons or were influenced by leaders and governments.

Some people think art museums are only for special or educated groups. Others think they should help everyone learn and grow. One museum leader, John Cotton Dana, thought museums should be useful to everyday people. He believed museums should be easy to reach, show many kinds of objects, and even lend items to schools to help teach children. He also supported having smaller museums in different parts of a city so everyone could visit them.

Online museums

Museums with major web presences

Many art museums have websites showing some art pieces, but only a few have large online collections. Some museums, libraries, and government agencies have created big online catalogues of their art. These include:

• The British Museum shows many objects online.
• The Library of Congress has prints and photographs.
• The Metropolitan Museum of Art offers images that anyone can download and use.
• The Rijksmuseum has many objects online.
• The National Portrait Gallery features many portraits.
• MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) has many art pieces and films.
• The Boston Museum of Fine Arts shows many works.
• The Fine Art Museums of San Francisco have many works online.
• The Harvard Art Museums display many works.
• The Louvre has many works with images.
• The National Gallery of Art has many works listed.
• The Mona Lisa Database of French Museums from the French Ministry of Culture
• The Gallery Photoclass in South Korea
• The Museum of Art & Photography (MAP) in Bengaluru, India, with many artefacts online

Online art collections

There are online art catalogues and galleries that are not part of any single museum. Some show many types of art from history, while others help sell modern art. Big auction houses like Sotheby's, Bonhams, and Christie's have large online databases of art they sell. The Bridgeman Art Library provides pictures of artworks for museums, art dealers, and professionals.

Folksonomy

Some online galleries work with many museums to organize art in new ways. They study how people describe art to make it easier to find. The steve.museum is one example. It works with the Guggenheim Museum, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Museum lists

An art museum, also called an art gallery, is a place where art is shown. These museums might be owned by the public or private groups and can be open to everyone or have some rules about who can visit.

Here are some lists of museums you might find interesting:

• List of museums
• List of most visited museums
• List of most visited art museums
• List of most visited museums by region
• List of largest art museums in the world

International and national lists

• World: World Heritage Site (s) (per UNESCO)
• World (modern art): Museums of modern art
• Latin America: Museums in Latin America, on the website of the Latin American Network Information Center (LANIC) of the University of Texas at Austin
• United States: Category:Institutions accredited by the American Alliance of Museums, alphabetical list with links.
• United States: ART MUSEUMS, ART CENTERS, and NON-PROFIT ART ORGANIZATIONS web page, sorted by state, on the website Art Collecting.com.
• United States: Museums page, listing (with links) the national museums of the United States, in the "History, Arts, and Culture" subsection of the "Citizens" section of the U.S. federal government's general information website USA.gov

Organizations

There are not many groups just for art museums. Most art museums belong to bigger groups for the arts, humanities, or museums in general. Some of these groups include:

• UNESCO – a United Nations group that helps protect and show the world’s cultures and arts.
• International Council of Museums
• Association of Art Historians
• Association of Art Museum Curators
• Association of Art Museum Directors
• Independent Curators International
• International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art (IKT)
• College Art Association (CAA)
• Small Museum Association
• North American Reciprocal Museum Association (NARM)
• The Artists' Materials Center at Carnegie Mellon University
• International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM)
• International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (IIC)

National organizations

• Australia: Australian Museums and Galleries Association
• Canada: Canadian Art Museum Directors Organization (CAMDO)
• Canada: Canadian Museums Association
• Japan: Japan Association of Art Museums
• Japan: Japanese Association of Museums
• United States: American Alliance of Museums, formerly the American Association of Museums
• United States: American Federation of Arts
• United States: National Art Education Association
• United States: American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (AIC)
• United Kingdom: The Museums Association (MA)

Other organizations (for multiple museums)

Regional, provincial, and state museum organizations

• Canada, Ontario: Ontario Museum Association and Ontario Association of Art Galleries
• United States, western states: Western Museums Association
• United States, western states: Museums West Consortium
• United States, western states: Western Association for Art Conservation (WAAC)
• United States, California: California Association of Museums
• United States, Florida: Florida Art Museum Directors Association

District, local and community museum organizations

• United States, Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution
• United States, Florida, Miami: Miami Art Museums Alliance
• United States, New Mexico, Taos: Taos art colony
• United States, New York, New York City: Art Museum Partnership
• United States, New York, New York City: Museums Council of New York City
• United States, Texas, Houston: Houston Museum District Association