Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, MN

The Minneapolis Institute of Arts is located at 2400 Third Avenue South, Minneapolis, MN 55404. The museum is closed on Mondays with free admission the rest of the time. Twenty five citizens of Minneapolis founded the Minneapolis Society of Fine Arts in 1883 and it has grown into the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. The building was designed in the neo-classical style and opened in 1915. There have been several expansions throughout the years, the latest being the Target Wing that added thirty four new galleries and forty percent more exhibition space.

There is a new Lecture Hall, Print Study Room, Photographs Study Room, and the Art Research Library is in a new location. What once started with about eight hundred works of art is now closer to eighty thousand. The objects span more than five thousand years and many cultures. The areas that are represented include: Africa, the Americas, Oceania, Design, Architecture, Craft and Sculpture, decorative Arts, Asian Art, Modern Sculpture and Paintings, Prints and Drawings, Photographs, and Textiles.

Approximately a half million people visit the museum every year and it is the largest educator of art in Minnesota. The museum has the Art Adventure program for elementary school children. Because of the museum's free admission policy, public programs, interactive media programs, and classes for adults and children it has gained its great reputation.

Some of the exhibitions that have been to the Minneapolis Institute of Art or will be coming include: In Pursuit of a Masterpiece, Josef Sudek and Czech Photography, iAfrica: Connecting with Sub-Saharan Art, From Our Ancestors: Art of the White Clay People and Until Now: collecting the New (1960-2010).

Other exhibits that are scheduled in 2010 are: Wild Things, Foot in the Door 4, New Pictures 2: Marco Breuer, Prints of Birds and flowers by Ohara Shoson (1877-1945), Desire and Deliverance: Drama in the Old Testament, Southern Exposure: Photographs of the American South, Mapping the Globe: Father Matteo Ricci and the Jesuit Mission in China, Robert Bergman: Portraits, 1986-1995, Mayumi Amada and Eun-Kyung Suh, Embarrassment of Riches: Picturing Wealth, and Jennifer Davis, Erika Olson, Terrance Payne and Joe Sonness.

The museum is closed on Monday, hours for Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday are from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm, Thursday from 10:00 am to 9:00 pm and Sunday from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm. The museum is also closed on Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and July 4th. Visitors can find the Institute one mile south of downtown Minneapolis by the intersection of 3rd Avenue South and East 24th Street. The museum gift shop follows the same hours as the museum and they sell gifts, jewelry, books, posters, prints, exhibition catalogs and gifts from the museum and its collections.

There are places to dine while at the museum which include: D'Amico & Sons ArtsCafe that features Neapolitan style pizza, Italian sandwiches and salads. They have a Sunday Brunch that begins at 11:00 am to 3:00 pm. The ArtsBreak has pastries and bakery items along with desserts