M. H. DE YOUNG MEMORIAL MUSEUM

Description

Essentials about the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum in brief

Located in Golden Gate Park, the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum is one of the most important art museums in the United States. With over one million visitors annually, it is one of the top 10 most visited art museums in the United States. The de Young Museum’s collections include works of African, Oceanic, and Pre-Columbian art, fine and applied arts from the United States, graphic works, and textiles.

The collection of the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum

The centerpiece of the de Young Museum is its collection of American art, which includes more than 1,000 paintings, 800 sculptures, and 3,000 decorative arts objects. It is the most significant collection of American art in the western United States. The de Young Museum’s textile collections are also among the most extensive in the world. They include more than 13,000 textiles made from a wide variety of materials, spanning 2,500 years and originating from more than 120 countries around the world. And beyond that, the museum’s collections of African, Oceanic and Pre-Columbian art are also among the most important in the world, with over 1,000 works each.

The history of the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum

Incidentally, the museum is named after newspaper publisher M. H. de Young, who planned the original museum building. The museum was founded in 1895 as an outpost of the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894. Due to severe damage in a 1989 earthquake, a new building was commissioned for the museum.

The building of the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum

The Swiss architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron won the architectural competition. The impressive museum building blends extremely harmoniously into the landscape of Golden Gate Park. The eye-catcher is a 44-meter-high observation tower from which there is a wonderful view in the direction of the Golden Gate and the Marin Headlands.