Knoxville Museum of Art
The Knoxville Museum of Art is the rich visual legacy of eastern Tennessee located within the gorgeous campus of the city's World’s Fair Park. World’s Fair Park is a lively and highly popular local social gathering place well-known for hosting annual festivals, live performances, meetings and conferences, and all the great spots within for reflection and learning. One quick look around will show you acres of well-manicured lawn, cascading falls, placid streams, and several various gifts of natural beauty. The Museum of Art within presents the influential visual legacy of eastern Tennessee alongside new art from the region and beyond. There are several exhibits of regional art within, as well as traveling shows, daily classes, and occasional live concerts. This modern four-story facility educates and serves a diverse community and strives to "enhance the quality of life and economic development" of the city.
The structure of the museum itself plays hosts to several amazing features of architecture, a modernly designed multi-level 53,000 square foot facility. Made of steel and concrete and named after the lead constructor, Jim Clayton, this gorgeous building is made of all locally quarried Tennessee marble. The museum began in 1961 as the Dulin Gallery of Art and changed in 1990 to what it is today. The interior features the rich culture, old and new, of mainly the Southern Appalachian region of Tennessee, such exhibits inside as Higher Ground (19th and 20th-century regional history) and Currents (recent local art). Be sure to check if there are any daily workshops, lectures, concerts, classes, family events, or special tours happening why you are here, and also visit the fun Gift Shop on the top floor before you go! See why 60,000 annual visitors make the trek here and also why this museum has earned what fewer than ten percent of American museums have, the seal of the American Alliance of Museums.
