Dallas Museum of Art – Dallas, Texas
The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) is an art museum located in the Arts District of downtown Dallas, Texas, along Woodall Rodgers Freeway between St. Paul and Harwood. In the 1970s, the museum moved from its previous location in Fair Park to the Arts District. The new building was designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes and John MY Lee Associates, the 2007 winner of the American Institute of Architects Gold Medal. The construction of the building spanned in stages over a decade.
The museum collection is made up of more than 24,000 objects, dating from the third millennium BC to the present day. It is known for its dynamic exhibition policy and educational programs. The Mildred R. and Frederick M. Mayer Library (the museum’s non-circulating research library) contains over 50,000 volumes available to curators and the general public. With 159,000 square feet (14,800 m2) of exhibition spaces, it is one of the largest art museums in the United States.
From the museum’s main gallery, visitors can access the sculpture garden, a wall-enclosed, open-air space conceived as a setting for the museum’s eclectic sculpture collection. The space is divided into distinct rooms by three freestanding water walls designed by Allistair Bevington of Barnes’ firm, each with cascading water flowing down into narrow canals at the base that join into one channel that stretches towards the north wall. In each room, small groves of live oaks are under-planted with spring bulbs and vinca in stepped triangular planting beds.
The museum also includes three interior garden rooms – the Tribal Court, the Dining Terrace, and Wisteria Court – which offer other opportunities for gathering and experiencing art. Along with Fountain Place, the Dallas Museum of Art was one of two projects completed by Kiley in Dallas.
European Art Galleries
The DMA’s European art collection is an exquisite grouping of paintings, sculptures, and works on paper with strengths in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. The European Art Galleries on Level 2 were completely reinstalled in the summer of 2019, prompted by the final bequest of 32 Impressionist and modern masterworks gifted by Margaret and Eugene McDermott to benefit the DMA.
The galleries offer a fresh interpretation of the Museum’s European collection, featuring rarely shown works that have been restored for exhibition, a new presentation of Old Master paintings and sculpture, and the integration of the McDermotts’ magnificent gift.
Highlights include artwork by Jacques-Louis David, Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, Canaletto, Claude-Joseph Vernet, Joseph Mallord William Turner, Edouard Manet, Gustave Courbet, Rosa Bonheur, Pablo Picasso, and Henry Moore. The collection is also distinguished by its outstanding holdings in Impressionist and Post-Impressionist art by Claude Monet, Berthe Morisot, Edgar Degas, Paul Cézanne, Gustave Caillebotte, Camille Pissarro, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, Paul Signac, and Édouard Vuillard, among others.