Joslyn Art Museum

The Joslyn Art Museum, commonly called the Joslyn, is the largest and most comprehensive art museum in Nebraska. Located in Omaha, it opened in 1931 as a memorial from Sarah H. Joslyn to her husband, businessman George A. Joslyn. It is the only museum in the state with a comprehensive permanent collection, spanning 5,000 years of human creativity across more than 12,000 objects. The museum holds particular distinction for its integration of Native American art into its broader galleries and its recent recognition by Prix Versailles as one of the world's seven most beautiful museum openings following its 2024 expansion.

The museum originated from Sarah H. Joslyn's determination to honor her husband George A. Joslyn, who died in 1916 as the richest man in Nebraska, having built the Western Newspaper Union into the nation's largest supplier of ready-print newspapers. In 1921, Sarah purchased six lots along Dodge Street between 22nd and 24th Streets. She sold her stake in the Western Newspaper Union to employees for $5 million in 1929, donating $3 million to build the memorial and found the Society of Liberal Arts to operate it. Construction by Kiewit began in 1928. At Sarah's request, the opening on November 29, 1931 occurred without fanfare, no speeches or ribbon cutting, though 25,000 to 30,000 people attended. Upon her death in 1940, control passed to trustees along with an endowment for acquisitions. The institution was renamed from Joslyn Memorial to Joslyn Art Museum in 1987 to reflect its expanding art focus. Free admission, one of Sarah's primary goals, ceased in 1965 but was reinstated in 2013 through the Sherwood Foundation, producing a nearly 60% attendance increase from 2010 to 2019. The museum closed for nearly two years starting in 2022 for a $100 million renovation and expansion, reopening September 10, 2024.

The Joslyn's collection of over 12,000 objects represents 5,000 years of human creativity and the world's diverse cultures, though its emphasis falls on European and American art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The ancient art collection includes an exceptional holding of Greek ceramics. European painting ranges from sixteenth and seventeenth-century masters through Romantic, Realist, and Impressionist works. American art encompasses early portraiture, Hudson River School landscapes, American Impressionism, and twentieth-century movements including Regionalism and Abstract Expressionism. The museum stewards significant collections of Western American art, including two of the country's most important holdings of works by Karl Bodmer and Alfred Jacob Miller, managed through the Margre H. Durham Center for Western Studies established in 1980. The museum also holds works by indigenous peoples of the American West, both traditional pieces and those created under European influence. Contemporary art is strongly represented, and following the 2024 reinstallation, Native American art is fully integrated into the general American art collection rather than segregated.

Among European old masters, the collection includes works by Veronese, Titian, El Greco, and Claude Lorrain. Nineteenth-century European holdings feature Delacroix, Gustave Dore, Corot, Courbet, and Impressionists Degas, Monet, Pissarro, and Renoir. American painting includes early portraits by James Peale and Mather Brown, Hudson River School works, and American Impressionist paintings by Childe Hassam and William Merritt Chase. The Western art collections are anchored by Karl Bodmer's watercolors and prints from the 1832-1834 expedition with Prince Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied, and by Alfred Jacob Miller's depictions of the 1830s American West. Twentieth-century holdings include paintings by Henri Matisse, Stuart Davis, John Sloan, and Robert Henri, Regionalist works by Grant Wood and Thomas Hart Benton, and Abstract Expressionist pieces by Jackson Pollock, Hans Hofmann, and Helen Frankenthaler. Sculptures by Deborah Butterfield, Robert Haozous, Donald Judd, Sol LeWitt, and Martin Puryear are also held. The Peter Kiewit Foundation Sculpture Garden, completed in 2009, contains twenty modern and contemporary sculptures including works by Auguste Rodin, Tom Otterness, and Albert Paley.

The original 1931 building is an Art Deco structure designed by Omaha architects John and Alan McDonald, father and son, who were close friends of the Joslyns and had previously designed their residence, Joslyn Castle. The building's facade draws inspiration from Egyptian temples, art moderne motifs, and the Nebraska State Capitol. Constructed of Georgia pink marble with 38 different marbles from around the world and stone from Europe and Africa in the interior, it was listed among the one hundred finest buildings in the United States in 1938. Sculptor John David Brcin designed eight exterior decorative panels referencing Plains peoples, both Native American and European, with inscriptions by Hartley Burr Alexander. The first major expansion, the 58,000-square-foot Walter and Suzanne Scott Pavilion designed by British architect Sir Norman Foster, opened in 1994, using marble from the same Georgia quarry as the original. The Peter Kiewit Foundation Sculpture Garden opened in summer 2009. The most recent addition, the 42,000-square-foot Rhonda and Howard Hawks Pavilion designed by Alley Poyner Macchietto Architecture and Snøhetta, opened in 2024 with a cloud-like form deliberately distinct from the original facade. This expansion earned Omaha by Design's Laurels Award in 2024 and contributed to the museum's Prix Versailles recognition.

The Joslyn Art Museum is located at 2200 Dodge Street in downtown Omaha, Nebraska. General admission is free, reinstated in 2013 after having ceased in 1965. Current hours are Tuesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Wednesday and Thursday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. The museum campus comprises three architecturally distinct connected buildings: the original 1931 Art Deco structure, the 1994 Scott Pavilion, and the 2024 Hawks Pavilion. Visitor amenities include the Durham Cafe in a glass atrium, The Shop at Joslyn, and ART WORKS: A Place for Curiosity, a hands-on creative space with nine stations. The reimagined sculpture gardens function as open-air rooms with native prairie plantings. Free group tours are available. The museum is owned and operated as a nonprofit institution, originally founded as the Society of Liberal Arts, and continues to serve as Nebraska's premier comprehensive art museum following its 2024 reopening.