Indianapolis Museum of Art

The Indianapolis Museum of Art is an art museum in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA.

The Indianapolis Museum of Art is among the ten largest and oldest general art museums in the United States. The museum traces its founding to October 11, 1883, when 18 Indianapolis residents signed articles of incorporation to establish the Art Association of Indianapolis. Among the founders was May Wright Sewall (1844–1920), who was known during her lifetime for her work in the women’s suffrage movement and as a founder of the International Council of Women.
Indianapolis Museum of Art

The association’s first exhibition, in November 1883, included paintings by American artists William Merritt Chase (1849–1916) and Alfred Thompson Bricher (1837–1908). The association’s first permanent museum and art school, the John Herron Art Institute and Herron School of Art, opened in 1906 at Pennsylvania and 16th streets in Indianapolis. In 1969, the Art Association of Indianapolis changed its name to Indianapolis Museum of Art, and in 1970 the museum moved to a new and much larger building on Michigan Road, a few miles northwest of the downtown area. Four new pavilions have been added to the original building since 1970, and the most recent expansion added 171,800 square feet  to the museum.

Among the museum’s early supporters were Eli Lilly (1885–1977), president of Eli Lilly and Company from 1932 to 1948; author Booth Tarkington (1869–1946); Herman C. Krannert (1887–1972), founder of Inland Container Corporation; and Caroline Marmon Fesler (1878–1960), who purchased paintings by Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh, Georges Seurat, Pablo Picasso and other important artists for the museum. The IMA's current director since 2006 is Maxwell L. Anderson.

The main floor houses primarily pre-20th century European and American artwork, the second floor non-Western artwork, and the third floor modern and contemporary art by such artists as James Turrell and Vito Acconci.