The Eskenazi Museum of Art at Indiana University opened in 1941 under the direction of Henry Radford Hope. The museum was intended to be the center of a “cultural crossroads,” an idea brought forth by then-Indiana University President Herman B Wells. The present museum building was designed by I.M. Pei and Partners and dedicated in 1982. The museum’s collection comprises approximately 45,000 objects, with about 1,400 on display. The collection is substantiated by a wide range of works, including a large collection of ancient jewelry and paintings by Pablo Picasso and Jackson Pollock. In May 2016, after the announcement of the largest cash gift in the museum's history, the museum was renamed the Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art in honor of Indianapolis-based philanthropists Sidney and Lois EskenaziThe museum is free and open to the public Tuesdays through Saturdays 10:00 a.m.—5pm, and Sundays noon–5:00pm, and is located on the Indiana University Bloomington campus at 1133 E. Seventh Street.HistoryThe Eskenazi Museum of Art opened in 1941 in a gallery space in Mitchell Hall under the newly appointed head of the Department of Fine Arts, Henry Radford Hope. The first exhibition, Sixteen Brown County Painters, opened on November 21, 1941. The catalog for the event contained a statement describing the goals of the gallery at the time: “The purpose of the Art Center Gallery… is to bring temporary loan exhibitions to the campus so that students may have an opportunity to study and see original works of art. Examples of diverse character will be brought to this gallery in order to show the multiple aspects of art both past and present.”
