The San Diego Museum of Art

The museum building was designed by architects William Templeton Johnson and Robert W. Snyder in a plateresque style to harmonize with existing structures from the Panama–California Exposition of 1915.{{cite web|url=http://www.sandiegohistory.org/bio/johnson/johnson.htm|title=William Templeton Johnson|publisher=San Diego Historical Society|access-date=October 4, 2007|archive-date=June 7, 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090607030500/http://www.sandiegohistory.org/bio/johnson/johnson.htm|url-status=live}} The dominant feature of the façade is a heavily ornamented door inspired by a doorway at the University of Salamanca. The Cathedral of Valladolid also influenced the museum's exterior design, and the architects derived interior motifs from the Santa Cruz Hospital of Toledo, Spain. The original construction took two years. Sponsor Appleton S. Bridges donated the building to the City of San Diego upon its completion. In 1966 the museum added a west wing and a sculpture court which doubled its size, and an east wing in 1974 further increased its exhibition space. Plans are underway for a renovation to the rotunda, sculpture garden, façade, auditorium, and other features.

The museum's collections are encyclopedic in nature, with pieces ranging in date from 5000 BC to 2012 AD. The museum's strength is in Spanish works by Murillo, Zurbarán, Cotán, Ribera and El Greco. Much of the museum's old master collection was donated by sisters Anne, Amy, and Irene Putnam. The museum's first major acquisition was the 1939 purchase of Francisco Goya's El Marques de Sofraga, which had belonged to a private family collection until that time and had never before been on public exhibition. The Putnam sisters provided financial backing for the purchase. The following year, director Reginald Poland acquired a portrait by Giovanni Bellini for the museum's collection. Then in 1941 the museum purchased a Diego Velázquez portrait of the Infanta Margarita of Spain, which was possibly a study for a larger portrait of her in Vienna. Other major benefactors during the museum's first quarter century were Archer M. Huntington and Mr. and Mrs. Henry Timken, whose small art collection is housed in the nearby Timken Museum of Art, established in 1965. In 2012, the Museum of Art received 48 German Expressionist paintings, drawings and prints from a range of artists, including Otto Dix, Egon Schiele, Alexej von Jawlensky, Gabriele Münter and Gustav Klimt from the collection of Vance E. Kondon and his wife Elisabeth Giesberger.Jamie Wetherbe (March 23, 2012), [http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2012/03/san-diego-museums-gifted-40-million-art-collection.html San Diego museums receive $40-million art collection] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120416163812/http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2012/03/san-diego-museums-gifted-40-million-art-collection.html |date=April 16, 2012 }} Los Angeles Times.

The museum houses works by Italian masters Giorgione, Giambattista Pittoni, Giotto, Veronese, Luini and Canaletto. Works by Rubens, Hals and van Dyck represent the Northern European School. The museum regularly hosts touring exhibits and has lately been working to display its standard collection in new ways, including an upstairs gallery discussing information which can be gathered by looking on the back of the canvas. The exhibition is complemented with a large collection of images, including portraits, Arnold Newman's work, and Mexican landscapes from the early twentieth century.{{Cite web|title=San Diego Museum of Art |url=https://infoblogscat.blogspot.com/2022/09/san-diego-museum-of-art.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220927101950/https://infoblogscat.blogspot.com/2022/09/san-diego-museum-of-art.html |archive-date=2022-09-27 |access-date=2022-09-27 |website=infoblogscat.blogspot.com|date=September 27, 2022 }}

File:Hieronymus Bosch Workshop (1450-1516) - The arrest of Christ (1515 ca.) - SDMA San Diego Museum of Art.jpg|Workshop of Hieronymus Bosch, The Arrest of Christ, c. 1515, oil on panel

File:Sánchez Cotán (Bodegón con membrillo, repollo, melón y pepino).jpg|Juan Sánchez Cotán, 1602, Quince, Cabbage, Melon, and Cucumber

File:Aeneas and his Father Fleeing Troy by Simon Vouet, San Diego Museum of Art.JPG|Simon Vouet, c. 1635, Aeneas and his Father Fleeing Troy

File:The Vision of Saint Anthony of Padua painting by Giovanni Battista Pittoni, San Diego Museum of Art.JPG|Giambattista Pittoni, 1730, The Vision of Saint Anthony of Padua, oil on Canvas, 35 1/2 in. x 23 1/4 in.

File:An Afternoon Stroll by William Merritt Chase, San Diego Museum of Art.JPG|William Merritt Chase, c. 1895, An Afternoon Stroll

File:Woman Combing her Hair by Renoir, San Diego Museum of Art.JPG|Auguste Renoir, 1907, Woman Combing her Hair''

File:Joaquin Sorolla - María en La Granja.jpg|Joaquin Sorolla, 1907, María en La Granja

File:Red Blossom by Alexei Jawlensky, Russia, 1910, oil on board - San Diego Museum of Art - DSC06745.JPG|Alexej von Jawlensky, 1910, Red Blossom, oil on board

File:Female Nude Reading by Robert Delaunay, San Diego Museum of Art.JPG|Robert Delaunay, 1915, Female Nude Reading

File:Henri Matisse, 1917-18, Fleurs (Bouguet), oil on canvas, 139.7 x 102.2 cm, San Diego Museum of Art.jpg|Henri Matisse, 1917–18, Fleurs (Bouguet), oil on canvas, 139.7 x 102.2 cm

File:Still-life by José Agustín Arrieta, San Diego Museum of Art.JPG|Still-life, oil on canvas painting by José Agustín Arrieta, c. 1870, The San Diego Museum of Art

File:John Alfred Parsons Millet.jpg|John Alfred Parsons Millet, John Singer Sargent c. 1892

File:Wonders SDMA.png

File:Guanyin.Sd.jpg

Important special exhibitions that the museum has hosted include The Precious Legacy (1984).{{cite news |last1=Damsker |first1=Matt |title=Heart of Czech Jewry Makes Way to S.D. How Did the Museum of Art Beat L.A. for a Show of This Magnitude? |work=Los Angeles Times |date=19 September 1984}}

In 2024, the exhibit "Wonders of Creation: Art, Science, and Innovation in the Islamic World" features works spanning 13 centuries that show the intersection of art and science.{{Cite web |last=Combs |first=Seth |date=2024-09-01 |title=Connecting art and science: Getty Foundation brings together 70 exhibits for PST Art |url=https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/2024/09/01/connecting-art-and-science-getty-foundation-brings-together-60-exhibits-for-pst-art/ |access-date=2024-10-24 |website=San Diego Union-Tribune |language=en-US}}

{{unreferenced section|date=May 2018}}

In 2010, the San Diego Museum of Art in conjunction with the Agitprop gallery created The Summer Salon Series. The program, curated by Alexander Jarman and David White, featured local emerging artists who presented and performed temporary art works and workshops in direct response to the Toulouse-Lautrec exhibition. Each of the ten presentations involved Contemporary Artists' responses to the Modern Art on display in the museum.

Each April since 1981 the museum hosts its major fundraiser, "Art Alive". Floral designers use flowers and other organic materials to express their interpretation of a work of art from the museum's permanent collection. For four days the resulting creations are displayed next to the art work that inspired them.{{cite news |title=Art in full bloom |url=http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_action=doc&p_docid=136EAF3987837A28&p_docnum=2&s_dlid=DL0111072123154205958&s_ecproduct=SUB-FREE&s_ecprodtype=INSTANT&s_trackval=&s_siteloc=&s_referrer=&s_subterm=Subscription%20until%3A%2012%2F14%2F2025%2011%3A59%20PM&s_docsbal=%20&s_subexpires=12%2F14%2F2025%2011%3A59%20PM&s_docstart=&s_docsleft=&s_docsread=&s_username=sdubsub&s_accountid=AC0110122214325408110&s_upgradeable=no |newspaper=San Diego Union Tribune |date=April 28, 2011 |access-date=July 21, 2011 |archive-date=October 25, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121025213940/http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_action=doc&p_docid=136EAF3987837A28&p_docnum=2&s_dlid=DL0111072123154205958&s_ecproduct=SUB-FREE&s_ecprodtype=INSTANT&s_trackval=&s_siteloc=&s_referrer=&s_subterm=Subscription%20until:%2012%2F14%2F2025%2011:59%20PM&s_docsbal=%20&s_subexpires=12%2F14%2F2025%2011:59%20PM&s_docstart=&s_docsleft=&s_docsread=&s_username=sdubsub&s_accountid=AC0110122214325408110&s_upgradeable=no |url-status=live }} The museum also hosts events such as "Culture and Cocktails", which encourage attendees to sample the collection into the evening during extended opening hours or partake in social events centered in the gallery.

{{Portal|California}}

{{reflist}}

{{Commons category|San Diego Museum of Art}}

• {{oweb|http://www.sdmart.org/}} – The San Diego Museum of Art

{{Balboa Park}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:1926 establishments in California

Category:Art museums and galleries established in 1926

Category:Art museums and galleries in San Diego

Category:Asian art museums in California

Category:Spanish Colonial Revival architecture in California

Category:Balboa Park (San Diego)