San Jose Museum of Art

The San José Museum of Art (SJMA) is a modern and contemporary art museum in downtown San Jose, California, United States. Founded in 1969, the museum holds a permanent collection with an emphasis on West Coast artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. It is located at Circle of Palms Plaza, beside Plaza de César Chávez. A member of North American Reciprocal Museums, SJMA has received several awards from the American Alliance of Museums.

The San José Museum of Art is the largest provider of arts education in Santa Clara County, serving over 45,000 children per year.[1] The permanent collection focuses on contemporary art by US West Coast artists, with a growing emphasis on art of the Pacific Rim. The collection includes more than 2,600 artworks[2] in a variety of media including sculpture, paintings, prints, digital media, photographs, and drawings.

Founded in 1969 by a group of artists, the art museum was first known as the Civic Art Gallery.[2] Ann Marie Mix and Susan Hammer were co-founding trustees of the museum.[2][3] The group sought to save a historic structure slated for demolition and to revitalize it as a community art gallery. The early arts organization was referred to as a "gallery" prior to the establishment of a permanent collection of artwork.[3]

In 1974, it was renamed the San Jose Museum of Art.

The museum established a partnership with the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1994.[5] Information about each exhibition was published for visitors in English, Spanish, Tagalog and Vietnamese, reflecting the diversity of patrons in San Jose in the 1990s.

By 1997, the museum had acquired a collection of approximately one thousand pieces of contemporary art, mostly works on paper.

Susan Krane, executive director from 2008 through January 2017, continued to grow the collection in size and stature.[6][7] Krane was succeeded by Susan Sayre Batton as executive director in April 2017.

By 2019, after 50 years of operation, the SJMA had acquired a permanent collection with 2,600 objects.[8]